



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 


Chap.. Copyright No. 


UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 







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GOD’S REBEL 






















































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GOD’S REBEL 


BY J 

HULBERT FULLER 

Author of Vivian of Virginia , The Patriot , Etc , 


CHICAGO 

REGAN PRINTING HOUSE 

1899 


25240 


Copyright 1890 


ON? Hulbert:^ W0< 





CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

I. 

The Game Begins 



PAGE 

1 

II. 

Childhood .... 


- 

12 

III. 

Hints and Helps from Mrs. Mason 

- 

- 

25 

IV. 

The Old and The New 


- 

35 

V. 

Safeguards of Literature 

- 

- 

44 

VI. 

Superstition and Fact 


- 

58 

VII. 

Going Down ! 

- 

- 

72 

VIII. 

Nannette - 


- 

79 

IX. 

Tangents and Tyros 

- 

- 

90 

X. 

A Reception and A Reminiscence 


- 

101 

XI. 

A Profound Problem 

- 

- 

115 

XII. 

Representative People 


- 

129 

XIII. 

A Winter Afternoon 

- 

- 

145 

XIV. 

All a Forgery 


- 

160 

XV. 

The Evolution of a Grease-spot 

- 

- 

175 

XVI. 

The Fairy God-mother 


- 

187 

XVII. 

Dr. Little is “ Pounced Upon ” 

- 

- 

197 

XVIII. 

The Light of The World 


- 

209 

XIX. 

Environmental Forces 

- 

- 

221 

XX. 

Momentous Occasions 


- 

232 

XXI. 

The Strike at Wheeling 

- 

- 

244 

XXII. 

The Crimson Sign - 


- 

257 

XXIII. 

Fairy God-mothers Again — and Cinderella 

274 

XXIV. 

Her Fatal Slipper - 


- 

284 

XXV. 

The Right to Live 

- 

- 

296 

XXVI. 

The Variety-Show - 


- 

310 

XXVII. 

Doubtful Security 

- 

- 

323 

XXVIII. 

The Bond of Nemesis 


- 

336 

XXIX. 

The Gods Send War 

- 

- 

351 


Epilogue - 


- 

367 



GOD’S REBEL 


CHAPTER L 
THE GAME BEGINS. 

“But,” she urged impatiently to the stolid heavy- 
faced man at her side, “it’s the second time it has 
won ! Don’t you see how everyone’s betting on four- 
teen?” 

“And why?” a faint shadow of a smile flitting 
athwart his dark features. “What’s happened to 
the sillies now that stampedes them on fourteen?” 

“Pshaw!” she began hotly; then paused as her 
eyes, in company with everyone else’s, became fixed 
on the magic hand of one who was known as a 
multi-millionaire whilst he scattered his gold gen- 
erously over the teens — “You, a Methodist min- 
ister’s son, ask me why?” 

“My native innocence, you mean,” he answered 
with amusement. “That’s why I ask, I suppose.” 

“No, no ! what’s the good of inbred superstition 
if it doesn’t tell you that when a number wins twice 
running it’s just bound to win the third time. But 
there!” she ended dejectedly, as the croupier called 
out “ Rien ne va plus;” — “it’s too late now. You’ll 
never succeed !” 

After all, his excess of superstition, his strong 
biologic impulse, perhaps, which impelled him to 
a belief in the infallibilities of the past rather 


2 


GOD'S REBEL. 


than to test the uncertainties of the future, saved 
them, as it had many times before in the brief past 
of their acquaintance. Still he did not choose at 
this time meanly to remind her of it. On the con- 
trary, his only expression was one of brute sym- 
pathy, as though vainly seeking to know her and 
sorrowful at the tumbling of her castle, even though 
he must refuse reverently to shower his gold over the 
ruins. For the luck had shifted to number thirty- 
three. 

“Faites vos jeux, messieurs.” . 

“Twelve hundred francs, Potiphar, and he bet 
ten thousand !” she said in amazed half-audible 
tones. 

“Humph, a millionaire,” he answered with care- 
less indifference as he reckoned in hard American 
dollars the amount of the man’s losses. “It’s noth- 
ing to him.” 

“What did you say?” she asked, but without tak- 
ing her eyes from the millionaire who, nothing 
daunted, again sprinkled his gold over the numbers 
from twelve to fifteen, and carelessly dropped a 
thousand franc note upon zero. 

But again a spiteful three thrust its forked tongue 
at him, wriggled and curled in electric glee; whilst 
the croupier raked in the gold, and the millionaire, 
without a change of expression, rolled on his way 
swaying in splendid insouciance. 

“Who is he, Potiphar ?” she asked. 

“The president of the Wheeling Car Works,” 
answered the solid looking gentleman. “I noticed 
by the Times yesterday that his workmen are mak- 
ing trouble and threatening to strike. He’s prob- 
ably trying to forget it.” 

“Oh,” and her eyes returned to the game. “But 
he left too soon,” she expostulated, with feminine 
irrelevancy. “This is the second time it has skipped 


THE GAME BEGINS. 


3 


the teens. And the third time, Potiphar, you 
know — ” She smiled bewitchingly. 

“Yes, my dear, I know / 5 replied he of the Egyp- 
tian title, but in a manner to denote his complete 
indifference to the art of conjury. “I left my purse 
at the hotel.” 

“Faites vos jeux, messieurs” chanted the crou- 
pier. 

“Oh, if I only had a napoleon !” she pouted, and 
turned her pretty head, so that the words came as a 
petition not lightly to be refused, into the ears of 
a young gentleman standing close behind her. 

“If you would oblige me,” he murmured, placing 
the coin in her hand, causing the splendid dark 
eyes to open wide with surprise and then dance with 
mischief as she thanked him, “For good luck,” and 
placed the coin on the number fourteen. 

And this time it won ; there was no disputing it ; 
third time and all. Even Potiphar was forced to 
smile in odd amazement, as the crowd drew a 
deep breath of relief that said audibly, “I told you 
so,” at this gratifying example of the no-freak of 
fortune. 

“Shall we go now, Enid?” he asked, weariness 
of the scene manifest in his voice. 

“Oh no; impossible! See? we are partners.” 
And she half closed one eye an instant indicating 
the young man who had stood behind them and 
loaned his napoleon, and who was now coolly plac- 
ing their wager just won over the pair, trio, quar- 
tette, and transversal including the number four- 
teen. 

“Rein ne va plus!” 

Again the monotonous chant closing the lists; 
the sing-song creak of the hinges of Fortune’s door 
in the strained faces of the multitude; the same 
faces, forsooth, that have looked on or taken part 


4 


GOD'S REBEL . 


in our universal gamble since the world began — 
princes and lords who, though they possess nothing 
else, at least display splendid breeding, secure in 
success or defeat; suave statesmen, men of affairs, 
greedy gamblers in blackball carelessly rubbing el- 
bows; the poet and musician with rapt expression 
and long hair, together with sexless creatures in 
transitional clothes, with a business expression and 
short hair. And lastly, women ; rosebuds and lilies, 
the flesh of white arms and flashing shoulders in 
the glaring lights and the stare of men ; the good, 
the sinful, the spotless, the guilty ; fair frail women 
whom men love for their very frailty, together with 
stark sufficient women — bereft of frailty, but as yet 
possessing nothing quite so sweet or feminine to fill 
its place — whom men are trying to learn to love; 
women pure and pale, painted and wanton, but 
nevertheless, women as they have always been and 
will probably never be found wanting. 

Nor is the game itself in any sense different from 
what it has ever been; no, merely the same old 
round wherein the grand croupier dykes in the vast 
ocean of gold, sprinkling now and then a few drops 
from the tips of his fingers upon the heads of the 
grateful but clamorous populace; sometimes, it is 
true, to the accompaniment of religious ceremonies 
and the tune of “it is better to give than to receive,” 
and sometimes without this mockery. Yet the 
splendid perspective of the roulette table never grows 
tiresome, either to player or to' the onlooking histo- 
rian. A vast green sea freighted with golden ships, 
now quiet, now tempest-tossed, and anon swept clean 
by a gale ; and then again placable, calm, aye, grand- 
ly pacific, so that the mind gropes instinctively back- 
ward into the past and the eye peers far out over the 
moonlit sea, till lo ! Charlemagne himself comes 
sailing into view, and we behold him not unjustly 


THE GAME BEGINS. 


S 


in the guise of the first grand croupier of Monaco. 
Yet another turn of the wheel and the Saracens come 
up, with flashing scimitars, scattering the early 
Christians to the four winds. Then the clouds low- 
er, as the rocky stronghold becomes lost and won 
in turn by Germany, Genoa, Milan — the prey and 
the home alike of pirate and despot ; but ever smil- 
ing with the sunrise, singing through the day with 
the music at her feet, and blushing like a maiden in 
the rose light of sunset, until France, passionate 
wooer of nations, by obtaining Nice and Savoy, em- 
braces her with a protecting. arm. 

Still the game never ceases ; and as there are no 
gamblers like women, so too there is none like Mo- 
naco, the gem and the bride of France. With the 
advent of Honore V. and his calculating croupier, 
Francois Chappon, fresh zest is lent to the play. 
Grain is the stake, and Honore V. keeps it well locked 
up in his own granaries. Nor must the housewife 
bake her own bread save under fear of dire penalty, 
for Honore is a thoughtful despot and has his own 
bakers employed to bake bread for his people ; some- 
times, it is true, out of condemned flour bought at 
Genoa and Marseilles. Whilst, still provident, he 
compels his bakers to keep an official register of their 
families and report whether or not they are eating 
the proper number of loaves. If perchance they are 
not, they must either be fined or imprisoned; for 
Honore must sell his bread, poor fellow! it being 
his only means of subsistence. 

One time, so it is rumoured, a ship came sailing 
into the harbour with a fat' captain and a well fed 
crew. At once the croupier’s suspicions were in- 
flamed ; therefore a search was made, and lo ! deep 
down in the hold of the vessel was found an ancient 
loaf that everyone had overlooked when throwing 
the ship’s bread overboard, as all vessels were com- 


6 


GOD’S REBEL . 


pelled to do before entering harbor. The stale loaf 
was confiscated, conveyed ashore, exhibited to Ho- 
nore — the ship was seized, and the fat captain 
barely escaped imprisonment in the dungeon by pay- 
ing a fine of five hundred francs. 

In this manner Honore V. started in life a poor 
boy, with only a common-school education and 
naught but a barren rock for inheritance; but by 
dint of push, hard work, and infinite attention to 
details, at the end of five years he had accumulated 
a fortune of six million francs out of a population 
of less than six thousand people. It reads almost 
like a romance, as our newspapers would say; so 
that one instinctively thrills to the regretful thought 
of what a success he might have achieved had his 
fortunes only been cast in a happier land, under the 
shade, let us say, of that famous buttonhole — no, 
buttonwood! — tree in Wall street.* 

But regrets, after all, are idle whilst the play con- 
tinues ; chances still abound, it is alleged, though to 
some it is strangely pleasing to muse upon the ante- 
cedents of the game as the wheel clicks. 

“Rein ne va plus!” 

The slowing whirr of the wheel under the heavy 
atmosphere grows fainter and fainter till it stops 
with a sharp click. Then the murmur of voices 
begins again amid the clinking of gold, as it flows 
in a constantly swelling current towards the crou- 
pier. 

“Why, he has taken it all!” 

For a series of turns the two had been steadily 
winning, and, as success at business invariably begets 

*“In 1792,” writes an apologist in a well-known maga- 
zine, “twenty-seven respectable citizens of New York met 
under a buttonwood tree in Wall Street and formed an 
association for the buyiftg and selling of stocks, of whose 
widespread beneficence they could at that time have had no 
adequate conception.” 


THE GAME BEGINS. 


7 


good feeling among the gamblers, they had been 
chatting together gaily, brilliantly. Now, however, 
there was a ring of remonstrance in her tone; she 
looked up at her partner, her face still flushed, but 
this time with indignation. Whilst he, with a heed- 
less laugh and keeping his eyes intent upon her face 
as though bewildered and fascinated with its beauty, 
replied : 

“No, not all. See? He has left us our wager — 
from courtesy, perhaps and he held up a napoleon. 
“Shall we continue ?” 

“But our five thousand francs ?” she began, fer- 
vently, then faltered, and flashed him a smile. “Oh 
dear ! It seemed so real. Thank you ; I don’t care 
to play again.” And, turning to the man behind 
her, she added, “Potiphar, give him our cards. 
Don’t you see he’s an American?” 

The free-masonry of their country’s name fetched 
a smile and an informal word as they exchanged 
cards ; then, the men lifting their hats, they parted 
and passed on in the moving throng. 

The younger man had not taken many steps, 
however, ere he felt a friendly hand on his shoulder 
and a familiar “Hello, old man!” close to his ear, 
which caused him to look up and reply, “Ah, Henry, 
is that you? I was just about to go in search of 
you.” 

“Yes, I saw you were longing for me,” said his 
friend. “I stepped in here a quarter of an hour ago, 
but found you were pleasantly occupied, and so went 
out for a stroll. By Jove ! but she was a stunner. 
Where did you pick her up, Kenneth?” 

“Who? pick who up?” Kenneth protested quiet- 
ly as they stepped out into the gardens. 

“Why, Delilah; the person I saw you playing 
with, of course. However, I don’t suppose you 
know her name.” 


8 


GOD’S REBEL. 


“No, that’s right; I don’t,” Kenneth admitted, 
pausing to light a cigar. “They gave me their cards, 
but I’ve not looked at the names. I know her hus- 
band’s, though; it’s Potiphar.” 

“Potiphar? Ha! ha! then I wasn’t so far off in 
my name after all.” 

“No,” the other conceded fairly, “Potiphar’s wife 
and Delilah were somewhat closely related, I fancy. 
However, here it is,” and, pausing under the glare 
of an electric light, he read the card: 

“Mr. and Mrs. Potiphar Phillips, Chicago, 
U. S. A.” 

“Odd name, very,” his companion commented. 
“Wonder what he does with it?” 

“Well, at least he doesn’t conjure with it, Henry. 
For the life of me I can’t understand how a man 
who hasn’t sufficient imagination to enjoy gambling 
can find any pleasure in the society of such a beau- 
tiful woman as that wife of his.” 

“Perhaps he is poor.” 

“Impossible. Didn’t you see what she had on?” 

“Had on ! No, I confess that I wasn’t struck by 
that exactly.” He laughed. “But have you actu- 
ally observed that it is the imaginative man who 
gambles?” 

“Oh, yes, I think so ; the imaginative faculty that 
permits a few men to get inordinately rich almost 
always implies the possession in a marked degree of 
those higher qualities which might have made such 
men equally famous as poets, astronomers, or in 
the higher mathematics, had their environment not 
been limited by ledgers and accounts. Whereas, 
take a man like this Potiphar, why ! he could never 
become very rich if he tried. He’s only a plodder ; 
he has no imagination. Obviously, his wife is a 
misfit.” 


THE GAME BEGINS. 


9 

“Humph ! And the specific cause for this sad state 
of so many wives is, I suppose ” 

“Oh, it’s a question of economics, of course. 
That’s the cause of everything bad.” 

They had strolled to the top of the terraces and 
now stood gazing a moment out over the glinting 
sea. The steel-blue light of the waning moon played 
over the water’s superficial restlessness and lit with 
a tender softness the distant castle of Monaco — the 
selfsame light that softens the Past, that glorifies 
the Present, and causes the dark, uncertain sea to 
forget its treacherous depths in a mirror of loveli- 
ness ; the mellow glow of romance, sacred in its very 
superstitions and wrapping the world in a warm 
mantle of conservatism wherein we sleep, and 
dream, and protest vigorously against all who dare 
rudely disturb or awake us. 

But ah ! ’tis only a borrowed glow after all. We 
forget that the grim, vulgar reality of yesterday 
becomes the alleged romance of to-day. We forget 
that this soft light playing over the moon’s scarred 
face covers naught save a scabrous sepulchre, mak- 
ing all life, all present humanity, seem but an empty 
dream. 

“Win anything, Henry?” asked Kenneth, return- 
ing again to the play. 

“No; the fact is, old man, now that my time is 
up in Vienna, and we have had our little excursion, 
I begin to feel more anxious about the future than 
I should really care to confess.” 

“Don’t. What’s the use?” 

“Well, for one thing,” he explained, “I met Dr. 
Blodgett here this very evening — the registrar, you 
know, of the university’s medical department — and 
he gave me to understand that most of the men who 
graduated during the past three years have failed 
to obtain a living practice. Naturally, I don’t feel 


10 


GOD’S REBEL . 


like gambling, and wish to get home and settle down 
now quickly as possible.” 

“Yes, but you forget,” Kenneth urged, with 
laudable conceit, perhaps, “none of these men have 
had your advantages — besides, the personal equa- 
tion.” 

“No, I don’t forget it; but it remains to be seen 
whether the public will care to consider it. Of 
course, it is different with you. Your place is wait- 
ing for you in the university, and every word that 
you utter in your lecture-room will mark you for 
what you are from the first. There’s no hocus-pocus 
or quackery in your profession; either what you 
practice is the truth or it is not; and the general 
public is at present interested enough to discover it 
immediately.” 

“Thank you ; I confess that I trust so ; only don’t 
be cast down, Henry, by what that old codger said 
to you. Why, I’d wager ten years of my life that 
you will succeed. As for starting home, I’m ready 
whenever you say.” 

“Suppose we sail Wednesday, then; or, no, we 
should have to leave here on the first train in the 
morning, and I wish to see Blodgett again.” 

“Very well,” his friend answered, “I’ll go on the 
early train and complete all arrangements, and you 
can come later. Will that be satisfactory?” 

The following morning, accordingly, found Ken- 
neth Moore off for Paris by the early express. Yet 
was there something incongruous in the hasty flight 
of the train back into the world of everyday thought 
and affairs, considering that nearly three months 
had elapsed in which he had heard nothing by tele- 
graph, letter, or newspaper of the world at large. 
But long absence — six months in Gottingen, fol- 
lowed by a year in Berlin in active study in his pro- 
fession — had served somewhat to silence the old 


THE GAME BEGINS. 


it 


yearning and impatience for home, so that upon 
joining his friend, Dr. Henry Holden, in Vienna 
some three months ago, they had hastily made ar- 
rangements for a trip to the Orient before returning 
to America. It scarcely seemed worth while to 
cable home of their newly formed plans; accord- 
ingly they merely wrote advising their correspond- 
ents to direct letters to Paris, where they would pick 
them up on their return. 

Arriving in Paris, he went direct to his bankers, 
where he was given a bundle of letters, which, the 
clerk stated, had been accumulating for several 
weeks. Thence, hurrying along the boulevard, he 
entered a cafe and found a seat at a table in a remote 
alcove. Opening the first letter that came to hand, 
which was addressed in a familiar hand, “Dr. Ken- 
neth Moore, Paris,” he read: 

“Dearest Kenneth : Still we hear from you from 
Rome, Athens, Constantinople, yet you might be 
dropping your letters to us from Mars so far as the 
hopeless task of trying to make you hear our replies 
is concerned. We have cabled; we have written; 
we have prayed; and there is something strangely 
pathetic to us in reading your enthusiastic accounts 
of the sights you have seen and the adventures you 
are having, whilst at your home has occurred that 
which would have robbed them of all their pleasure. 
For, Kenneth — dear Kenneth !” 

He paused ; a veil came over his vision, and, 
though he completed the sentence and groped blind- 
ly ahead for a line or two, he was conscious only 
of a sob at the heart and the mute appeal of his 
unuttering lips, “My father.” A waiter appeared 
and stood bowing politely. Kenneth did not see 
him, and the boy disappeared and returned directly 
with a newspaper. Yes, though monsieur had not 
granted him the extreme happiness of noticing him, 


GOD'S REBEL . 


14 

yet he had obviously performed his part by guessing 
his country and fetching him his whole kingdom in 
miniature. Monsieur was sad; homesick, quite 
probably. See, he could now be at home again. 
There was the great strike among the starving work- 
ingmen; the great scandal in Congress; and the 
great — what you call it — the choke? no, the lynch- 
ing; and the equally great railway accident that 
the Americans seem never to tire of. What a vivid 
imagination these Americans had, that they should 
persist in trying to make two trains pass each other 
at full speed on the same track! Sometimes they 
passed; yes, he admitted it; but sometimes — Mon 
Dieu! it was a queer country where men’s lives were 
cheaper than steel rails. And Jacques, who spoke 
four languages as fluently as a native, shrugged his 
shoulders yet more fluently, and told himself posi- 
tively for the hundredth time, that no ! much as he 
should like to go to America and become ver’ rich, 
there was no satisfaction — no satis factshiong, in 
running so many chances against violent and sudden 
death among a barbarous and incomprehensible 
people. 

But monsieur was ver’ tired. See, his head was 
resting on the table. Ah, monsieur was sleepy ; he 
would come and wait on him later. 

And Jacques vanished, drawing the curtains softly 
behind him. 


CHAPTER II. 

CHILDHOOD . 

There come moments of pause in the headlong 
hurry of youth that send the mind groping swiftly 
backward into the past, seeking wildly amidst the 


CHILDHOOD. 


13 


storm for that dim, nearly forgotten beginning of 
first- remembered things, until Time, the victorious, 
is at last forced to take the retreating step, the while 
immediate scenes and voices become strangely si- 
lenced in the swell of the more remote. Lo ! again 
one stands absorbed in the olden play, seeing the 
curtain rise and fall, with gladness, a smile upon 
the lips, as a child : the world and its fair unfolding 
all as at first, ere Ulysses had journeyed a mile. 

“Kenneth! O Kenneth !” 

Out of the vanished years the voice commanded, 
fetching scene and all fresh in his memory as though 
twenty odd years had not flown, whilst yet he an- 
swered, the lad of six. 

“Yes, papa.” 

“Well, come and jump in if you want to ride this 
morning. No, never mind the school, my lad; 
there's time enough for that and to spare.” And the 
doctor lifted his hitching-weight into the phaeton, 
stepped in and drew the reins taut. 

“Whoa! wait a moment,” he added. “Run into 
the house, Kenneth, and tell Jennie I’m called out 
to Mr. Anthony’s and that we may not be back to 
lunch.” 

“You mean Enid’s father’s, papa?” asked the 
boy. 

“Yes, run along; be lively.” And, beholding the 
child’s eagerness at mention of Enid’s name, the 
doctor laughed, then sighed: “Ah, the course of 
true love. Dear me !” 

Of his mother the child knew nothing at all save 
what he had learned in later years, she having died 
at his birth. Knew little, that is, save that she was 
of foreign extraction, but whether Basque, Spanish, 
or gypsy, doubtless she herself could not truly have 
said; indeed, some of the doctor’s old neighbors 
might have told him that his father had practically 


14 


GOD'S REBEL . 


married the girl off the street. One night, so it was 
remembered, Dr. Moore was called to see a pa- 
tient living in a dingy, dirty apartment over a 
noisy saloon at the corner of the business street 
a couple of blocks from his residence. Entering 
the room, he discovered a girl moaning and lying 
on the dirty bed, dressed in a soiled and faded 
silk gown with short sleeves that disclosed one 
arm lying limp and helpless. A couple of rascally- 
looking street musicians stood near the bed, one of 
them still holding his violin by its neck, whilst the 
other had dropped his flute on the floor and was 
now attempting to quiet the girl. Replying to the 
doctor’s command to have all particulars, the vio- 
linist, after much parleying in Spanish with his com- 
panion, put aside his instrument and picked up the 
flute. “Een zees way, senor,” he stammered. “Him 
her fader ; ver’ good fader. See ? She playa harp, 
senor, ah ! so beautiful ; but zees night, no ! she no 
playa mucha good. So her ver’ good fader, he taka 
za flute een zees way, see ?” * And the rascal took 
it by one end and fetched the ivory joint down over 
his extended arm in a manner that left no doubt. 

The doctor’s eyes flashed. He uttered something 
abrupt and decisive about “damned dagoes,” glanced 
meaningly at an open window, and the pair fled pre- 
cipitately down the back stairway. Then, taking the 
girl in his arms he carried her gently to his own 
home, mended her broken arm, and for full two 
years afterwards he would listen with all of a child’s 
delight to that sweetly pathetic voice born of the 
South and generations of oppression, watching with 
infinite joy the beautiful arms and tapering fingers 
caressing the strings of that now silent harp into 
a song or a chant — and paid for it all with a broken 
heart when she died. Nor had he chosen to marry 
again; the balance of his life was given solely to 


CHILDHOOD . 


15 

his practice and the rearing of the son she had left 
him. 

Now, all of this happened before the time of the 
great fire, which is the way all time is reckoned in 
the city of Chicago. Before the fire Dr. William 
Moore was reputed to be wealthy; being one of a 
considerable number who held approved securities 
that were shortly to vanish as completely as though 
never created. The source of wealth, however, re- 
mained ; not capital, nor schemes of importing such 
from abroad, but labour and natural resources; 
that couple which God hath joined, and which man 
in his infinite foolishness hath temporarily parted — 
labour that was grand, willing, diversified; of the 
kind that is able to convert a marsh into a teeming 
city, or the uninhabited prairie into great fields of 
ripening grain, though the primitive curse of gold 
or silver never were known. That capital was in 
any sense necessary to labour was after the great 
fire clearly disproved; but that capital took advan- 
tage of this superstition in order to multiply itself 
was not only widely evidenced in Chicago, but in 
hundreds of other western cities to-day. 

But, however these things may be, whether it was 
because of vast capital or giant labour — which latter 
shortly created its own capital — that population mul- 
tiplied, that productivity doubled and trebled, that 
costly buildings were erected and beautiful boule- 
vards were extended outward over the prairie, Dr. 
Moore and hundreds of others were never after- 
wards able to regain their fortunes. And, though 
the newspapers joyfully stated at the beginning of 
every new year how rapidly wealth had increased 
because the price of land had doubled, the only effect 
that he had been able to grasp was that with every 
new year his patients seemed to have less and less 
to pay for medical services. At any rate his collec- 


i6 


GOD'S REBEL . 


tions had fallen off by ten, thirty, fifty per cent; 
whilst charity work, which was becoming more and 
more fashionable among well-meaning people, kept 
him busier and harder worked than ever; though 
ever in a spirit of cheerful and good-natured mys- 
tery. For to create wealth by the mere arbitrary 
doubling of land prices, or to expect anything good 
to result out of the giving of charity to able-bodied 
people, seemed to him about as senseless in the one 
case and as purposeless in the other as for him to try 
to raise his portly person into the air by pulling at 
his bootstraps. 

But Dr. Moore was no specialist in economics, 
his life being so absorbed in the daily routine of his 
profession that it had rarely occurred to him that 
he as an individual must help solve the riddle of 
the industrial sphinx or be devoured. Yet he had 
religiously tried to keep pace with the lightning 
speed of modern industrial society in order to be 
able to guide Kenneth more truly towards an early 
and substantial success in life. For success was truly 
the great desideratum of the age, nor was there 
any longer the shadow of a doubt as to the strict 
significance of the term; in sooth, in this day of 
plutocracy in church and university, for any one to 
insist that Galileo and Bruno were successful despite 
their splendid scientific achievements, when the one 
was burnt at the stake and the other spent the final 
ten years of his life in prison, were as untenable and 
as wholly unwarrantable proof of success to-day as 
then: the power that rules, whether monarch or 
dollar, or however subtle and chameleon-like be its 
form, being as ready as ever to crucify or offer the 
goblet of hemlock to whatsoever priest, poet, or 
painter that dares to dispute its divinity. 

Hence the good doctor had puzzled himself from 
the days when Kenneth was a mere child in trying to 


CHILDHOOD . 


17 


decide upon the lad’s fitness for various careers, 
though what to make of him only became more 
urgent and difficult of solution as the days went by. 
For the lad was peculiar, impressionable to the last 
degree, and candid to the core; nor did his contact 
with others in school or college ever serve to stifle 
such feelings, or to develop those other qualities that 
young men commonly wear upon their- sleeves and 
that compel the world to remark : ‘‘He is smart ; he 
will succeed.” On the contrary, aside from a cer- 
tain pugnacity of disposition which was oddly at 
variance with his dreamy nature, the lad grew up 
wedded to books and to music. 

A picture of him taken at about the age of fifteen 
would have shown a striking resemblance to that 
portrait of Keats; the eyes large, luminous with 
truth, and somewhat wide apart ; the forehead pale 
and beautiful, and caressed with a cluster of dark 
red curls; the nose straight and perfect; the mouth 
sensitive and a trifle large. Some of these features 
the doctor saw whenever he chanced to look in the 
glass; others were only a memory to him, causing 
him to glance at the lad, to turn away, and gaze 
again. As for his height, it may have added some- 
what to the boy’s pugnacious spirit, and it certainly 
tormented him not a little to find, as he grew to 
manhood, that he was below the medium, being, in 
fact, scarcely five feet eight. However, the doctor 
merely smiled at this conceit, telling him that it was 
a fine thing to be short, as biology would some day 
prove. “Less legs and more brain, my lad.” Yet 
when walking with his father and being invariably 
told to “step lively,” he had sometimes protested 
earnestly, and, as he thought, with great cogency. 
“No, Kenneth,” his father corrected, “you have 
simply to let your legs swing the faster,” and 
referred him to the law governing pendulums. 


i8 


GOD’S REBEL . 


“Every quick and rapid step will add years to your 
life.” 

But when the boy had scarcely entered his teens 
the doctor had already given up with a heavy sigh 
the dearest wish of his heart — namely, for his son 
to succeed him in his practice. Aye, it was impos- 
sible; he knew it now; and, as the days grew on 
he began to doubt whether the lad would ever 
succeed at anything that people called practical with- 
out his own or somebody's else miraculous interven- 
tion. For not only was the lad’s blood foreign — 
and the doctor scarce blamed him for that — but there 
were foreign thoughts in his head and foreign in- 
stincts in his heart and foreign conclusions in his 
mind; foreign, that is, to modernity and America; 
causing the father to ponder with despair upon this 
alien infection which had crept into his child at baby- 
hood and waxed ever stronger with the years. In- 
somuch that by the time Kenneth had quit college 
the doctor knew indubitably that his son was wedded 
in every fibre and cell to the literature and science 
of the Ptolemys of Alexandria, of the Khalifs of 
Bagdad, the impregnate Latins of Andalusia — sad 
heretics, all of them. Whilst the sounds that went 
singing round the old house from his son’s violin, or 
anon the deep-drawn wail of the cello under the 
slow bow of a master’s hand and a lover’s touch, 
and which found a mournful echo in the silent harp 
in the corner, would oft catch the doctor upon the 
very threshold as he returned to his home from some 
sick-bed, and fetch the tears to his eyes for more 
reasons than one — alas ! for more reasons than one. 

Ah, these children ; these children ! 

Howbeit, this drive to the Anthonys with his 
father was one of the child’s earliest fixed memories. 
It was in the spring of the year; the sunlight fell 
athwart the face of the city, causing it to wear a 


CHILDHOOD. 


19 


smile after the long cold winter ; on the great lake 
the boats were making their regular trips up and 
down, whilst the tugs in the river were industriously 
belching their dirty black smoke over the new gran- 
ite buildings. But southward the parks and the 
lawns seemed never so green and refreshing; chil- 
dren played over the grass ; there were fine houses, 
with hospitable porches and broad lawns, where 
young ladies in summer dresses amused themselves 
with the then fashionable game of croquet, and 
shady avenues where nurse girls in white caps 
wheeled those younger scions of the vigorous city 
who were some day to devote their lives to the acqui- 
sition of dollars in accordance with the very loftiest 
traditions of their fathers and the fittest of the whole 
human race. 

Some five or six miles out, close to the shore of 
the lake, a gentleman stood waiting on the porch of 
his house as they drove in ; calling out, with a quick 
note of relief in his voice : 

“Ah, here you are, doctor, at last! I’m very 
glad to see you, I’m sure. My wife began to get 
impatient — feared you couldn’t come.” 

The doctor stepped out of his phaeton. “What’s 
the trouble, Hiram; anything in particular?” 

“No, of course not; that’s the deuce of it,” irrita- 
tion audible in his voice. “It’s only another of 
those miserable headaches. Too much society. For 
heaven’s sake, doctor, tell her she’s wearing the life 
out of herself and me and all of us with so blamed 
much nonsense ! Besides, it costs money.” 

The doctor laughed. “It strikes me, Hiram, you 
are a bit unreasonable. Don’t you know that there 
must be certain people to make money and certain 
others to spend it ? Why, that’s the very foundation 
of an aristocracy ; it’s what we’re trying to build up. 
Seems to me you’re not very patriotic.” 


20 


GOD’S REBEL . 


“No, I’m not,” he retorted abruptly; “another 
year of it and I shall go west, where there’s more 

business and less of this confounded soci ” And 

they vanished within. 

Kenneth meanwhile had snapped the hitching- 
chain into the bridle, and was on the point of fol- 
lowing when a little girl with flushed cheeks and 
flaxen curls came running round the corner of the 
house. 

“Kennet’ ! O Kennet’ !” she cried, seizing him in 
an informal hug. “I’se so glad you’ve come.” 

He laughed, looking down in her eyes. “My 
mamma,” she added ingenuously, “always kisses 
little boys when they come here.” 

He shook his head quickly, in sudden bashfulness. 
That sort of thing might do very well for little boys. 
“But she never kisses a man , Enid,” he protested 
positively. 

“Oh, yes, she does, sometimes,” she insisted as 
they moved away over the lawn towards the lake. 
“Wait ! you must come this way, Kennet’.” 

“Don’t you want to see the boats sail ?” he asked 
longingly. 

“No, not now,” she declared, “I’ve got a tea-party 
all ready.” 

The boy stopped short in awful dismay. “Tea 
party, Enid!” he cried. “Oh, dear! I don’t like 
tea-parties.” 

She pouted. “But you might like it just to please 
me, you know.” She seemed to have heard the 
words before, to speak instinctively. 

“But who’s there?” he maintained, dubious, still 
hanging back. 

“Pshaw!” she cried, getting ruffled. “ ’Tisn’t 
anybody ’vited ’cept you and me, and Maud — she’s 
my big dolly. Now, will you come, Mr. Kennit’?” 

Her eyes flashed indignantly ; and, seeing that his 


CHILDHOOD. 


21 

fears were more formidable than warranted by the 
actual numbers present, he humbly begged her for- 
giveness. Hand in hand they hastened to the spot 
beneath the elms where the tiny table was spread, 
and where Maud patiently awaited the coming of 
the hostess and guest of honor, seated there prettily 
like any of a hundred well-bred young ladies and tea- 
party habitues, any one of whom might well have 
envied her manner and the blase society smile on 
her elegant features which was warranted to be one 
of the very latest and most fashionable things in 
smiles. 

Afterwards they went down to the lake, which 
at this hour was as quiet as a mill-pond, with scarce- 
ly breeze enough to stir its surface, and, finding that 
the water was warm, the children removed their 
shoes and stockings and waded out for some dis- 
tance from the shore. Then for a space they amused 
themselves loading Enid’s ship with sand and shells 
and pretending that it was going to Africa. But to 
Kenneth’s disappointment, instead of sailing far 
out over the lake and beyond the horizon, the ship 
always returned. It destroyed the illusion ; though, 
as Enid had reminded him, she guessed it was her 
very own ship and she didn’t want it to sail away 
off there and never come back any more. 

“But you mustn’t want it to come back, Enid,” 
he argued. “You ought to pray for it to go away 
off there where the missionaries are and carry sand 
to the heathen.” 

“Who are they, Kennet’ — the ’ishionaries?” 

“What ! the missionaries ? Doesn’t your mamma 
tell you about them, Enid?” 

“No,” and she shook her head sadly; “my 
mamma always has such a bad headache.” 

Accordingly he proceeded to tell her all about — 
about — well, about religion, and how badly we 


22 


GOD'S REBEL . 


should all of us feel about “the poor heathen who 
have no clothes to wear” — Enid’s eyes twinkled — 
“and no Bibles, and no Sunday-school books, and 
don’t know how to say their prayers ” 

“Oh, goody !” cried Enid, clapping her hands. 

“And no tea-parties, either,” he added quickly. 

“Oh,” she sighed, and at once became serious 
again. She wondered how she and Maud could 
ever endure that. 

But at last, when the sea gulls began circling 
shoreward and the black clouds rose suddenly out 
of the east, whilst the fishermen all drew in their 
lines and hastened ashore, and the breeze sprang 
up, growing fresher and stronger every moment as 
signs of the gathering storm increased, Enid be- 
came quite ready to let Kenneth have his will with 
her ship and dispatch it off for Africa in good 
earnest on the scudding wings of the storm. Aye, 
she even contributed one of the dear little tea-cups 
which belonged to her “set” and placed it carefully 
away in the hold of the vessel “for the ’ishionary.” 

And, trimming the sails critically, the lad held it 
a moment, perhaps stirred with the same poetic 
frenzy of a Magellan or Columbus ere putting a 
theory into experience, and then weighed anchor. 
Ah, what a sailer it was! “See, Enid! how it 
throws the spray from its bows, and what a splendid 
wake it leaves behind!” What power, what calm- 
ness, what majesty! A magnificent wake in sooth. 
It scarcely seemed possible that the lake itself would 
ever be able to blot that out and make it all one 
again with itself. The triumph of love, philanthropy, 
navigation even, could surely be proved in the prog- 
ress of this magnificent ship on its way to Africa, 
carrying its load of precious sand and religion to 
the heathen. Already the hull of the vessel was 
becoming invisible, and presently only the white 


CHILDHOOD. 


23 


topsails could be seen silhouetted against the black- 
ening horizon. Then for a space the ship seemed to 
be encountering rough weather; the “Sturm und 
Drang” played havoc with its tiny sails, whilst two 
pairs of childish eyes strained anxiously till they 
could see it no more. Whereupon they placed their 
trust in Providence and two minutes afterwards the 
boat upset. 

The following day, it may be confessed paren- 
thetically, the Reverend Ebenezer Griggs, who was 
strolling along the shore with his little son by the 
hand, picked up a beautiful boat all shorn of its 
masts and sails, and, holding it towards his son, he 
said: “See, my son, this is one of God’s lessons. 
The fate of this frail craft warns us to avoid the un- 
known, which wicked, blasphemous men seek to 
traverse by what they foolishly term science. All 
good people should continue to walk calmly and con- 
tentedly along the shore, keeping their eyes fixed 
landward, forever and ever, amen.” 

But to Kenneth, standing there at her side and 
seeing the sails no longer, Enid said : “Is the ship 
in Af’ca now, Kennet’?” 

And the waves, with their great white blossoms 
rolling shoreward and breaking at their feet, half 
drowned his answer, though the fresh young hope 
at his heart cried, “No, Enid; but it’s on the way.” 
Whilst the wind caught up his words and echoed 
them back in his ears. “It’s on the way; on the 
way !” Over the darkened world, with the wings of 
light his fancy sped; whilst a lad’s longing that 
knows not time, nor day, nor impediment, fetched 
the light to his eyes and the wildsome laugh to his 
lips as he stood with his head thrown back to the 
shrieking storm. 

“But, Kennet’, it’s raining!” cried Enid, clutching 


24 


GOD'S REBEL. 


his hand. “Won’t you p’ease pull up my stockin’ 
and take me home?” 

******* 

And, sitting there in the little cafe in Paris, Ken- 
neth reread his father’s letter for the fifth time, 
the while past and present swept over him and sent 
the blood surging wildly through his brain. “I fear, 
my son,” he read, “that you will be called a ‘the- 
orist’ upon returning to your home and taking up 
your work in the university. However, we shall not 
be alarmed when we remember that the world was 
built by a Theorist, and that it has been only be- 
cause of a theorist here and another fortunate the- 
orist there that the world has been kept moving 
along. When the giraffe first began stretching its 
neck in search of more food it was probably laughed 
at by its fellow animals who gained their living by 
grovelling in the dirt or consuming their fellows. 
‘Pooh ! behold the theorist !’ and the lion winked at 
the hippopotamus. Whereto the giraffe: ‘Gentle- 
men, the proof of the pudding is in the eating,’ 
and again he stretched his neck after a choice morsel 
that made the lion fairly pale with envy, whilst the 
hippopotamus oozed heavily out of sight with a 
despairing sigh.” 

“Poor father!” Kenneth smiled softly as the 
waiter reappeared and again offered him the great 
American newspaper. Accepting it this time, he 
noticed hastily that it was a copy of the Chicago 
Republican , whilst almost the first item that his 
eye fell upon stated that Mr. and Mrs. Potiphar 
Phillips had arrived at Paris. 

“Phillips, Phillips? Ah!” And then, finally, it 
all came over him with a rush, in connection with 
the intelligence contained in this letter of his 
father’s. Aye, ’twas the selfsame voice that had 


HINTS FROM MRS . MASON 25 

appealed to him for a napoleon, crying out over the 
years from the storm : “Kennet’, won’t you p’ease 
pull up my stockin’ and take me home?” 

He drew forth the card given him the night be- 
fore, studying it a moment thoughtfully, then lit ,a 
match. “Potiphar’s card,” he mused, whilst the 
flame consumed it, a cynical smile playing round his 
mouth. “Oh, yes, and Mrs. Potiphar’s.” 


CHAPTER III. 

HINTS AND HELPS FROM MRS. MASON 

“ I wonder if Kenneth returned last night, Ed- 
ward. Have you seen Mabel to-day?” 

“No, not since yesterday afternoon,” replied the 
person addressed without looking up from his 
evening paper. 

“Dear me! But don’t you think we better go 
over and find out? It seems to me the boy will 
be lonesome, and somebody ought to go over and 
talk with him and try to cheer him up. Just think, 
Edward, it has been two years since he left home, 
and to come back and find his father dead, with the 
house all lonesome and deserted — oh, it must be 
awful! I’m sure he would feel better, and that I 
should, too, if I could only have the chance to talk 
with him a bit. That makes anyone feel better. 
Don’t you think so, Edward?” 

“Eh, what’s that?” asked her husband, startled 
into confusion by her direct question and possibly 
too sudden pause. For Mrs. Mason’s voice be- 
longed to that species of uncatalogued afflictions 
which men have learned to endure through genera- 
tions of suffering, and which, like a trolley-car or 


26 


GOD'S REBEL . 


similar annoyances, always startle one most when 
they stop too suddenly or begin again without ade- 
quate warning. 

“Why, about Kenneth, Edward; I was say- 
ing 

“Oh, yes, I heard you,” said he, turning a page 
of his paper. “I saw Mabel yesterday and she said 
she had received a telegram from Kenneth and that 
she expected him that evening.” Whereupon Mr. 
Mason again lost himself in the intricacies of the 
sugar-tariff scandal as reported from Washington. 

“Dear me! then he’s been home twenty-four 
hours and not one of his very own relatives has 
been to see him yet. I declare it’s too bad, Edward, 
to treat anybody so, and we his only blood relations 
that he has on earth! Let’s see, how many years 
has it been now since your sister died and Mabel 
went to live with the doctor ? And that great lonely 
house, with the rooms all dark and the musical in- 
struments all silent in the parlour, and those tall 
book-shelves in the library that fairly haunt any- 
body to look at with their yellow leather bindings 
and outlandish titles: 'Hope on the Heart,’ 'King 
on the Kidney/ 'Lilly on the Liver.’ Land sakes! 
I don’t see how Mabel ever stood it to live there all 
alone with that old housekeeper after Dr. Moore’s 
death, and those carpets that are that soft you can’t 
hear your own footsteps speak to you when you 
walk. I never did believe in Mabel going there to 
live, anyhow ; though, of course, Dr. Moore was her 
mother’s brother, but then, you are her father’s 
brother, you know, Edward, and it don’t hardly 
seem right, seeing that she’s your own flesh and 
blood. Now, do you think so, Edward?” 

“Humph, a sweet mess, that !” Edward muttered, 
finishing the article on the sugar scandal and pro- 
ceeding into the details of the man who had mur- 


HINTS FROM MRS . MASON 


2 7 


dered seven wives in a single year. “No, Helen, I 
don’t suppose it was just the correct thing, you 
know,” he ventured recklessly — in reply to her last 
question presumably. And again he plunged into 
his paper. 

“Well, I declare, Edward, it does me good to 
have you agree with me for just once in awhile; 
it’s so dreadful hard ever to get you to express an 
opinion on things that / think are so important and 
had just ought to be attended to. Now, that’s just 
the way it was when your brother died and Mabel 
went to live with the doctor. You know I told you at 
the time what a careless man Dr. Moore was about 
collecting his money, and that he would just ruin 
the girl by being too kind and spending too much 
money on her for music and education and all that 
kind of thing that girls seem to think they just must 
have nowadays or else go broken-hearted. That’s 
just the way he has done with Kenneth, you know. 
I declare, when I think of all the money that’s been 
spent on that boy’s education, and then to think of 
the pretty things that money would buy, it just 
seems downright wicked sometimes. And what on 
earth is he going to do with all that education any- 
way, that’s what I want to know? Let’s see, what 
is it you said he’s going to teach in the university ? 
Oh, yes, sociology. Humph ! and isn’t that one of 
those fads that the newspaper spoke about the other 
day, in an editorial, you know? Yes, I’m sure that 
was it; the editor said if some of our newspapers 
and colleges didn’t stop preaching sociology that 
Englishmen wouldn’t invest any more money in this 
country and that our republic was bound to fall all 
to pieces in consequence. But that’s just like Dr. 
Moore to go and educate his son in this fashion. 
And what will Mabel do, I wonder ? What do you 
think, Edward; what will become of her?” 


28 


GOD’S REBEL. 


“Dear me!” and he stroked his chin meditatively, 
“the prosecution alleges that he made soap of his 
last wife,” answered Edward slowly. 

“Goodness gracious me! whatever are you talk- 
ing about, Edward ?” and Mrs. Mason dropped her 
embroidery in alarm. 

“Eh ? Why, my dear, I thought it was you who 
was talking. I was thinking about this case. I beg 
your pardon, Helen, if I disturbed you.” And, again 
adjusting his glasses, he resumed. 

“But, Edward, wait! Don’t you really think we 
ought to go there?” 

“Go where, my dear?” he queried darkly. 

“Why, over and see Kenneth, of course. You 
know how bad he must feel to come home and find 
his father dead and buried. I’m sure if it was you 
now, Edward, who had come home after being away 
two years only to find me dead and your house 
all empty, that you would feel like having somebody 
come in and talk to you. Why, it’s only common 
decency and respect, Edward.” 

“Possibly, my dear,” he admitted, but without 
being very clear in his mind. “Still, I hardly think 
it’s worth while to disturb him to-night. To-mor- 
row is Sunday, you know ; won’t that do, Helen ?” 

“Disturb him ? Dear me, Edward ! you never did 
know what it was to feel sympathy for anyone. You 
get so wrapped up in your law business that you 
seem to forget that folks have any feelings.” 

“But, my dear, isn’t Mabel there with him?” 

“Why, yes, of course she is; but, after all, Ed- 
ward, do you think it’s exactly proper for them two 
to be alone in that great, big house?” 

Edward knitted his brows. “Please explain,” he 
queried, “what the size of the house has to do 
with it?” 

“Why!” she cried, taken aback for a moment; 


HINTS FROM MRS. MASON 


29 

“can you never be serious, Edward? You know 
what I mean.” 

Mr. Mason rustled his paper nervously. “Non- 
sense, Helen; they’ve lived there like brother and 
sister for the past fifteen years. Nobody has ever 
found any fault with the arrangement that I know 
of.” And again the evening newspaper threatened 
to turn the conversation back into its legitimate 
stream of monologue. 

“But listen, Edward, and do put down that horrid 
old paper for a second,” she insisted. “Do you think 
Kenneth intends to marry her, now that he’s re- 
turned ?” 

“Marry whom?” 

“Why, Mabel, of course,” she retorted. 

“Nonsense,” he returned shortly. “Kenneth is a 
man.” 

“Goodness me! And isn’t Mabel a woman, I 
should like to know? I declare, Edward, I never 
saw any one in all my life who seemed to appre- 
ciate so little his own brother’s child. Anybody 
would suppose that you considered she wasn’t good 
enough for Kenneth, and I just say it’s a shame 
for her own father’s brother to treat her so. And 
she plays the piano beautifully. You know your- 
self, Edward, that she has the most extraordinary 
talent for music ; never in all my life did I ever see 
any one who could make her fingers fly so fast over 
the keyboard as Mabel. The poor girl ! you know 
she has no father and mother, and that we are the 
only true blood relations she has on earth. I tell 
you she’s every whit good enough for Master Ken- 
neth; and I’ve just told her so, too.” 

“No, you haven’t, though?” he asked quickly. 
“Now, look here, Helen, you know I love Mabel the 
same as you do, but I do hope you haven’t been put- 
ting any silly notions into the child’s head,” 


30 


GOD’S REBEL. 


“Silly notions, Edward?” 

“Well, about her marrying Kenneth, for instance. 
Why, I tell you it would be the greatest misfortune 
that could happen to either of them.” 

“I don’t see why,” she argued; “especially since 
the doctor saw fit to divide his property equally be- 
tween them both. You know very well that if they 
keep the property together it will be better than for 
them to divide and squander it.” 

“Pshaw! Confound the property! It’s their 
marrying that I object to. The property is too 
small to cut any figure in a case like this.” 

“Oh, yes, I know, Edward; that’s just your way. 
You never would try to save and economize.” 

“No, and what’s more, I never shall,” he declared 
bluntly. “I have no patience or sympathy with 
those who seek to make a virtue of the worst pas- 
sion of the human race, namely, saving and selfish- 
ness.” 

“And that’s just the reason we’ve never got on 
any better, Edward, it ” 

“Got on? Who in thunder wants to get on, 
Helen? Haven’t we got a good home and enough 
to be comfortable?” 

“Why, yes, of course, Edward, you know I’m not 
complaining. Dear me, no! I think everybody 
ought to be contented with his lot and not be helping 
these demagogues and democrats and anarchists 
stirring up the people into a riot and keeping En- 
glishmen from investing their money here. And if 
the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer I 
guess it’s nobody’s business but their own. Anyway, 
the Bible says ‘the poor ye have always with you,’ 
but, of course, we haven’t as much money as the 
people next door, Edward, and there’s no use pre- 
tending that we have. Only it must be very pleas- 
ant to be president of some charity club and to have 


HINTS FROM MRS. MASON 


31 


your picture in the newspaper for everybody to see 
and know that you take an interest in the poor. 
And that reminds me, Edward/’ nearly drowning 
afresh in a new flood of ideas, “that I forgot to speak 
to you about the poor family just round the corner 
next to the alley. They are awfully poor ; the wife 
has been sick in bed for three years and her husband 
lost his job during a strike, and the oldest son, 
who is a bricklayer, fell off a scaffold the other day 
and broke his leg. The father came to our back 
door yesterday begging for provisions, and I gave 
him that cold roast that was left over last Sunday. 
You know, Edward, we should never have touched 
it again anyway. I never could bear to eat meat 
after it got too old, though, of course, he was very 
grateful for it and thanked me with tears in his 
eyes. Poor dear old man! Hark, was that the 
bell? I just believe it’s a message from Mabel.” 

And Mrs. Mason arose and passed out of the 
room, leaving the air weary and perplexed behind 
her. 

Meanwhile a scene of fewer words was progress- 
ing between the two principals of that lady’s conver- 
sation, for Kenneth had arrived home the night be- 
fore and had been busy all day assisting his father’s 
solicitor in straightening out the tangled affairs of 
his estate. This evening, seated at his father’s desk, 
with Mabel leaning on the arm of his chair, he was 
running over hastily and making mental memor- 
anda of the papers that had been accumulating 
and pigeonholed during a space that covered nearly 
his entire lifetime. 

“Here’s a package that will interest you, Kenneth, 
perhaps,” said Mabel softly. “Do you know, for the 
past year he had taken great delight in everything 
that concerned your own work. No matter how 
slight or trivial, whenever he came across anything 


32 


GOD’S REBEL. 


that he thought would interest you he made me copy 
and index it.” 

“Dear father — and poor Mabel!” he murmured, 
smiling and placing the package carefully away. “By 
the way, has Dr. Little called lately?” 

“Oh, yes ; he was here only a few days ago to 
inquire when you were expected home. He re- 
mained a few moments and talked with me; said 
he knew you would be pleased to see how the uni- 
versity has grown during the past two years, build- 
ing after building, granite and oak and marble.” 

Kenneth frowned. He had, in fact, heard enough 
when abroad of Dr. Little’s success as a promoter, 
from which he began to fear results the reverse 
of beneficent. Not merely in the Rockland Uni- 
versity, either, but on every hand, wherever colleges 
needed money — and what ones did not? — he ob- 
served the same subtle and corrupting influ- 
ences at work; so that, latterly, college presidents 
had come to be chosen less for their scholarship and 
more for their ability to wring money from the in- 
ordinately swollen purse of some millionaire. Hence, 
after many centuries, it seemed, the democratic idea 
had progressed so far that men who could amply 
afford the luxury no longer sought to purchase im- 
mortality for their technically damned souls by giv- 
ing largesses to St. Peter’s advance agents ; but, on 
the contrary, after long years spent in every conceiv- 
able chicanery, they now found themselves desirous 
to purchase that at which all their lives they had 
mocked and reviled and ground under the heel — 
namely, the esteem of their fellow-men. So that they 
must needs found libraries and universities, albeit 
only to be roundly condemned if they did so, and 
again if they refused, such being one of the many 
paradoxical proofs to Kenneth’s mind of a society 
false in its every economic foundation. 


HINTS FROM MRS. MASON. 


33 

“I suppose you told him, Mabel, that I should be 
ready to take up my work Monday ?” he asked. 

She nodded. “Do you see what IVe been doing ?” 
She pointed to the doctor’s ledger. “I’ve posted all 
those accounts for you.” 

He smiled, half sadly. “I’m sorry, Mabel ; I fear 
you’ve had all your work for nothing.” 

“Oh, no, surely not,” she persisted. “Why, Ken- 
neth, there are over fifteen thousand dollars in ac- 
counts !” And, her mind full of the picture of the 
good old doctor out in unseasonable weather and 
hours that kill, she was half inclined to be angry 
with what she deemed Kenneth’s indifference. “You 
will need it so much, you know.” 

For answer his arm stole round her, and he kissed 
her affectionately, with reassurance. Good friends 
and playmates, such, in fact, was all they had ever 
been. They had loved and quarrelled and made up 
again ever since childhood; but, despite his being 
the elder, it was generally her will that controlled, 
though he knew it not. His was, besides, a com- 
passionate nature, and something in Mabel’s sudden 
helplessness seemed to call on him now for protec- 
tion, and something in her own manner may have 
compelled it from him without any distinct con- 
sciousness of the fact on her part. Moreover, occu- 
pied as he had been in latter years, his fancy had 
never found time to lie dreaming and spinning the 
adorable angel, gown of azure and all, who in the 
golden some day was to set the authentic spark to 
his soul. Study and travel, it is true, had done much 
to shape the aberrant aims of his youth, and to set 
them in a fixed and noble direction ; but as for those 
adventitious claims that society immediately im- 
poses, he was as thoughtless as a child, and as help- 
less. 

As for Mabel, some whispering ghost of the 


34 


GOD'S REBEL . 


garrulous Mrs. Mason may have reminded her 
that Kenneth was hers by right of inheritance, and 
that, anyway, it was all part of the doctor’s design 
in leaving his property to them jointly. Moreover, 
she had always admired and respected him, in a 
way; he was always so obliging and considerate 
in waiting upon her, which spoke volumes in his 
favour. Not but that there were dozens of other 
young men who would have been proud to do the 
same, for Mabel was attractive, and the doctor had 
been as generous with her as with his son in all that 
implied education. But, despite her somewhat su- 
perficial nature, she was ambitious withal, and there 
is that, perhaps, in the return of a young man from 
a foreign university quite as potent to enthral the 
heart of a girl as brass buttons and a uniform. How 
manly he had grown ! She had never blushed before 
in a way that caused her cheeks to burn when he had 
chosen to kiss her, or, rather, when she had per- 
mitted him. True, there were other worshippers, 
taller and whom she thought finer looking; and 
who — no, whose fathers had dollars for every penny 
that Kenneth possessed. But no one else had his 
ways, his impulses, his magnificent prospects ; com- 
pared to him at this moment all other young men 
were but the merest dawdlers, indifferent drones. 

She yielded ; she had never known it was really 
like that to be loved. It surprised her. And the 
following morning she smiled at herself in the 
glass, prettily, unaffectedly, with satisfaction. 

“How he has changed in his absence!” she said 
to herself. 


THE OLD AND THE NEW. 


35 


CHAPTER IV. 

THE OLD AND THE NEW. 

The first six months that followed on Kenneth’s 
return had passed rapidly, and by this he was 
well on with his work in the Rockland university. 
An eventless period, perhaps, to such of his fellow 
teachers as continued to indoctrinate the ideas of 
their grandfathers, in joyless iteration, into the 
heads of the listless and yawning young gentlemen 
in their class-rooms. But to him, and to most of his 
students whom he had succeeded in arousing into an 
enthusiastic and vital belief in his subject, the time 
had been one of splendid presage, luminous with 
truth, thunderous of Olympian prophecy. More- 
over, his relations with the men in the other depart- 
ments were most cordial and friendly ; he ap- 
pealed to them constantly, scarcely a day passing- 
in which he was not reminded that the very roots 
and elements of his specialty were broadly contained 
in those various scattered snatches of truth which 
men have collected from chaos and named science. 

So far, however, aside from illustrations afforded 
by the surrounding industrial life, there had been 
little to give a strong human impulse to his work ; 
although by the mere energy of his heartbeats, his 
eternal sympathies, he had been able to lift up from 
the foul muck of its degradation his beloved science, 
that under his hands was no longer to be termed “the 
dismal.” For he had gone back to Nature, resting 
the entire structure of his special profession on this 
single query: Given a Republic, a fertile country, 
a thrifty and intelligent population, how shall we 
provide subsistence for the whole people ? This was 


36 


GOD’S REBEL. 


the substance of his political economy, rather than 
vainly seeking to tell a few people how to get rich 
and the masses how to be patient under monopoly 
and oppression. 

But one morning whilst he sat at work in his 
study, there came a knock on his door, and, in reply 
to his absent ‘'Come in !” Mabel’s voice asked : 

“Are you very busy, Kenneth? You have a 
caller.” She laid a card on his desk, face upward. 

“Ah, the Reverend Ebenezer Griggs,” he read 
wonderingly. “Who in the world is he, Mabel? 
The name sounds familiar somehow, but I can’t 
place him.” 

She explained. Dr. Griggs was a newcomer, she 
believed, but he was at present pastor of the Rock- 
land Baptist Church. “I suppose he is seeking con- 
verts,” she added, smiling ruefully. “Dear me ! you 
were never even baptized. What shall I do ?” 

He frowned and bit his penholder. Hitherto he 
had enjoyed a peaceful immunity from calls of this 
kind, but now, on account of his work, his position, 
his influence — well, he had apprehended the fact that 
he might any day be called upon to declare his prin- 
ciples and subscribe to some disagreeable constitu- 
tion. 

“Please keep him in the parlour, Mabel,” he said 
hurriedly. “I’ll be in in just a moment. Thank 
you.” 

Howbeit the Reverend Ebenezer Griggs was no 
more ominous nor to be avoided than others of his 
kind. He was rather a tall, full-blooded, thick-set 
individual with reddish whiskers, who ordered his 
life and work in accordance with certain well-defined 
rules and conventions of the human race, and 
though he was a person of infinitely more respect for 
faith and dead traditions than for such questions 
as are commonly called “live,” he doubtless tried to 


THE OLD AND THE NEW. 


3 7 


live honestly in extent to the truth that was in him, 
insomuch that he seldom spoke harshly of his 
neighbours when outside of his pulpit, even though 
he could not always refrain from congratulating 
himself and his hearers that God had been good to 
him in permitting him to be born a Baptist instead of 
a Methodist or a Roman Catholic. This, however, 
was only one of his little idiosyncracies that his 
parishioners found easy to forgive in a man of so 
much positive virtue and vigour of expression — if, 
in truth, they ever noticed this trifling and not un- 
lovable little conceit. 

He always spoke, moreover, in a deep voice 
wherein a certain gruff heartiness and assurance 
were not unpleasant; indeed, to many, this very 
compelling note of his may have constituted his 
chief charm : force, even whilst travelling in a 
wrong direction, being naturally more attractive 
than a resistance so weak as to appear contemptible. 
Mr. Griggs had also done some slum work. 

“I have called, Professor Moore,” he explained, 
after his usual preliminary pleasantries, “first, to see 
whether you do not desire to come into the church 
with us; and, secondly, whether you do or not, if 
you won’t kindly consent to give us three or four 
Sunday evening lectures on subjects connected with 
your work ?” 

Kenneth signed to Mabel to remain, and, avoiding 
the first, he grasped vaguely at the second and more 
pleasing proposition. 

“I thank you, Dr. Griggs. It would, of course, be 
a privilege to extend my work in such a manner,” 
he replied tentatively. 

“Good ! I knew you would feel that way.” Draw- 
ing his chair closer to the professor’s and taking 
a slip of paper from his pocket, he continued : “Now, 
I’ve outlined here, very generally, a series that I 


38 


GOD'S REBEL . 


have entitled The Necessity for Inspiration in the 
Humbler Walks of Life.’ I believe you grasp my 
meaning, of course — namely, that the lowest toiler 
in the field, the mine, the factory, should feel and 
must feel the same inspiration in. his work that is 
felt by his employer or manager. It is a wonder- 
fully fruitful subject, professor, one on which I 
have long meditated. It has fortunately occurred 
to me, however, that you are better prepared to 
treat it than I am.” 

Kenneth bowed. The presumption and cheek of 
the man took his breath away. Their point of view 
was obviously so utterly at variance. 

“You doubtless catch the significance, professor,” 
Dr. Griggs went on, gracefully. “Such a series of 
lectures, I believe, would do much to make thinking 
people satisfied and restore the labourer’s old-time 
content with his lot ; this, too, in the face of all this 
godless and unprofitable labour agitation that con- 
fronts us on every hand ; and ” 

“But,” Kenneth answered, unable to mask his 
feelings any longer, “it isn’t true, Dr. Griggs. I beg 
your pardon a thousand times, but you are wholly 
mistaken !” 

Dr. Griggs was profoundly surprised. He was 
not apt to be mistaken, least of all to be told so. 

“You mean about this labour agitation?” he 
asked. 

No, Kenneth protested, there was no end of that, 
of course; but about “inspiration in the humbler 
walks of life.” Why, the very idea was an insult 
to the mind of an intelligent being. “You have 
failed to allow for the fact, Dr. Griggs, that the con- 
dition of the labouring man in this country is no 
longer as it was twenty years ago. Opportunities 
to work for himself have passed; he is now little 
better than a slave, hence can properly feel little 


THE OLD AND THE NEW. 


39 


inspiration in contemplating his condition, and it 
would be no less than mockery to tell him to feel 
inspired whilst receiving in general less than half 
what he rightfully earns.” 

“But, my dear sir, don’t you believe in Chris- 
tianity ?” 

“Pardon me, Dr. Griggs, but that is beside the 
question,” the professor parried courteously. “If 
you mean to ask whether I think a belief in Chris- 
tianity will correct our many economic injustices, 
I answer No! most emphatically No! For seven- 
teen hundred years organised Christianity has been 
on the side of the oppressor and against the op- 
pressed.” 

The minister made a move as if to rise ; clearing 
his voice, he said : “I certainly did not know you 
felt — well, like this, professor, else I should not 
have asked you. True, I grant that there are many 
deplorable conditions that — er — seem impossible to 
surmount, but this is only another reason why the 
divine truths of the Bible should be taught more 
generally. You remember, of course, what Christ 
said about the poor being always with us; and, 
whilst I do not admit that it is a condition of 
slavery, even if it is, would it not be better to teach 
contentment than to incite men to violence and open 
rebellion ?” 

Dr. Griggs stood upright, having clinched his 
argument to his fullest satisfaction. And, chagrined 
at having committed himself in this manner and to 
no purpose, Kenneth saw at once that he must in 
some way convince this opponent or else stand in 
danger of his inconvenient displeasure on every fu- 
ture occasion. And so, declaring frankly that he 
regretted this idle difference of opinion, he added : 

“As for the lectures, Dr. Griggs, if you will agree 
to give me three hours of your time any afternoon 


40 


GOD’S REBEL . 


this week, I shall be only too ready to speak after- 
wards on whatever Sunday evening you may name.” 

Again the clergyman was surprised, somewhat 
disagreeably; he certainly had not called for this! 
Common courtesy, however, compelled his assent. 
But as the days passed by without his even calling 
to fulfill his agreement, the professor, not to be 
thwarted after going thus far, finally wrote him a 
letter reminding him of his promise. Whereto 
there came an answer that Dr. Griggs had been so 
occupied with the routine work of his parish for 
some time that he had really found no time to avail 
himself of Professor Moore’s kindly offer. “On the 
fifteenth, however (Thursday, P. M.), I hope to be 
at leisure and shall be pleased to call on you at your 
home.” 

Kenneth smiled as he read it. “I mean to show 
this man, Mabel, though I may never teach any one 
else, that there are conditions in this world, wicked 
and unjust conditions, that the Christian church 
never has bettered and never can; and that any 
church so full of pessimism and stock arguments 
for the perpetuation of poverty, is a church that is 
dead, and justly hated.” 

Mabel shook her head, rippling an arpeggio from 
the piano, where she sat. 

“Oh dear! You know, Kenneth, nearly all the 
university people attend his church. It will only 
make trouble.” 

“Yes, I know, but, you see, there is trouble al- 
ready. There’s always trouble wherever you find 
ignorance and well-fed indifference seated in high 
places. Dr. Griggs, perhaps, means to be fair. 
Well, if he does I will give him a chance to see some 
of these economic problems so clearly that there will 
be no longer any excuse for his blindness. Then, 


THE OLD AND THE NEW, 


4 T 

if he agrees with me, I have won a distinct promo- 
tion and advantage all along the line.” 

“Nonsense ! If he agrees with you he will prob- 
ably lose his church,” she objected. “Dr. Griggs 
cannot afford to tell the wealthy people in his con- 
gregation of the evils you will show him. His con- 
gregation make their money out of those very evils. 
Well, do you think they will relish being told that 
they are found out, that most of their time-honoured 
institutions, as you say, are founded upon fraud?” 

She played on, impetuously, and Kenneth walked 
the floor. In his heart he knew that Mabel was 
right. The social problem by this time had ceased 
to be so profound that people with half an eye 
could not see through it and understand fully that 
those whose pocketbooks were at stake would array 
themselves solidly against social reform at every 
point. 

“I am beginning to wish, Kenneth,” said Mabel, 
slowly and coming to a pause in her music, “that 
you had chosen some other subject than economics.” 

“Hm! You mean something that’s dead? Latin, 
for instance.” 

“Yes, it’s safer; people can’t quarrel over it.” 

He stopped. “But you know, Mabel, I’m too fond 
of life for that. I believe in the laws of growth and 
development; indeed, they are the only laws I do 
believe in. That’s one reason I love economics, not 
for itself, but as a means to an end — and such an 
end! when this paltry bread-and-butter existence 
shall become a thing of the past.” 

He resumed his walk up and down. 

“Still, you might have chosen something else,” 
she persisted. “There are other sciences that grow.” 

“Yes, but they don’t promise freedom.” 

“Not even music?” she asked quickly. “Here; 


42 


GOD’S REBEL . 


have you seen this last concerto of Goltermann’s ?” 
She waved it to him from the piano. 

She knew that would arrest him, and it did. 
Glancing it over hastily, but already half lost in its 
harmony : “Please play the prelude, Mabel.” 

Taking his cello, he tuned it softly as she played 
on. Here at least he could stand, with none to 
deny, on the shores of those limitless seas, reaching 
out vague, longing hands to the unknown. As 
Mabel perhaps felt, this after all was his life. But 
under what alien skies and foreign forces had it 
escaped him? How natural, how instinct with the 
artistic impulse of past generations was his every 
movement, as with a sweep of the bow he launched 
himself into the aberrant andante and glided gently 
onward into the shadowed stream that flowed be- 
neath the willows and murmured amongst the moss- 
grown stones with the song of spring and the light- 
some joy of the allegretto. Pausing, tripping, run- 
ning, but ever ascending towards the authentic 
source, the Infinite fountain-head; anon stealing 
along on tiptoe, until, with a prayer on the lips as 
he parted the way and shook the vagrant curls back 
from the flushing forehead, he stood at last alone, 
aloof, lost in the boundless abandonment of the 
noble adagio. O what olden son of Woden dwelt 
within that wondrous shell ! How it breathed ! how 
it breathed ! and how it sobbed to the syncopation ! 
The hovering hand that swayed and stilled, the 
angel tremolo, the heavenly harmonic ringing true, 
that was prayer and whispering answer to the 
passionate appeal; thence onward with precipitate 
clamour, culminating with sweeping chords and a 
last, blind, maddening flash. 

Yet again he played the adagio, and again pian- 
issimo. Silence followed. 


THE OLD AND THE NEW. 


43 

“Didn’t you like it, Kenneth ?” she asked, with a 
smile. 

He rose. “Oh, yes; it is beautiful. It means 
everything — and nothing.” 

He placed the cello back in the corner. 

She flushed. “Not even as much as your old 
economics ?” 

“No,” he replied, smiling the while, “not even as 
much as old economics. It is all too indeterminate, 
mysterious. I think, however, if this eternal bread- 
and-butter problem could only be settled, as it has 
never been for five thousand years despite its sim- 
plicity, that then I might care to fiddle a little, that 
then humanity might take on loftier flights both in 
music and in literature.” He waited an instant, add- 
ing, “Till then I scarcely care very much either for 
one or the other. It seems too heartless ; affords no 
real freedom.” 

“O Kenneth ! but it would, it would — freedom of 
a truer sort. Your aspiration is absurd. Listen! 
is there no freedom in this?” She broke off into 
Grieg’s spring song, playing with infinite grace and 
expression. 

“Yes, very pretty, very pretty,” he conceded, paus- 
ing the while. “Individual freedom, of a sort — ’tis 
a fool’s paradise.” 

She turned round, with a laugh that was half 
vexation, hands idle in her lap. “You mean, I 
suppose, that life will never be noble so long as 
people must work for a living? But when do you 
expect the millennium, please? And are you will- 
ing to wait ?” 

He frowned. “No, you know better than that, 
Mabel. You know I neither expect nor hope for the 
time when none will have to work, when cold roast 
turkey will be found roosting ready to hand in 
every tree. But what I do ask for is that machinery 


44 


GOD’S REBEL. 


and every other means may be brought to its rightful 
use in making this problem of a mere subsistence 
simpler and easier for the masses, instead of their 
lives being cursed and crushed out of them, as at 
present. Every intelligent person knows that it is 
nothing but the oppression by the rich, propped up 
by the church, that perpetuates poverty and makes 
life hideous. It is this, for one thing, that some- 
one should try to show the Reverend Ebenezer 
Griggs, that there can be no Christianity, no true 
fraternity, so long as one half of the world is sys- 
tematically employed in robbing the other half. It 
is the system that must be changed, not the people. 
I wish you wouldn’t misunderstand me in this !” 


CHAPTER V. 

SAFEGUARDS OF LITERATURE. 

But already the domestic economy of their home 
was becoming a thing to cause Mabel no little 
uneasiness. At first she had trusted that the 
income from some of Dr. Moore’s old accounts 
might help them, at least till Kenneth should re- 
ceive an increase in his salary. Alas ! she had for- 
gotten the fact that few people can bring them- 
selves to the point of paying their doctor whilst he 
lives, and none at all after he is dead. Consequently 
she collected scarcely a penny of the thousands of 
dollars due, and, though the doctor had left a small 
life insurance, there was also a mortgage on his 
house sufficient to absorb that completely. It fretted 
her, preyed upon her continually, till one day she 
resolved to speak of it, to have it over. She found 
occasion to broach the subject to her husband one 


SAFE G UARDS OF LITER A TURE . 45 

morning ere his hour came for quitting the house. 
“Don’t you think, Kenneth, we’d better apply this 
insurance money on the mortgage?” she said, apol- 
ogy for the interruption softly audible in her tones. 

He glanced up from his book. “What’s that? 
Oh, no, there will be something more coming in 
presently.” 

“Indeed I don’t see how, unless you are promised 
more salary.” 

“Yes, of course; after a time, Mabel, that will 
come all right. Let me see. By Jove! I’m glad 
you reminded me of it. Here’s my book, you 
know ; I had nearly forgotten it,” and he picked up 
a package of manuscript. “This ought to bring 
us a thousand dollars at least.” 

Mabel smiled incredulously. “You mean that 
manuscript the publishers sent back to you from 
New York?” 

“Yes; but that cuts no figure, Mabel. You could 
scarcely expect a New York publisher to see any- 
thing good in this sort of a book. I shall let some 
Chicago firm publish it. It’s strange,” he added, 
rising hurriedly, “how it has slipped my mind since 
it came back. I shall take it downtown with me 
now.” 

She shook her head. “I hate to say anything, 
dear, but ” 

“But what ?” he asked as she paused. “Don’t you 
like the book, Mabel?” 

“Y-yes, I like it — because you wrote it. But, 
some way, it doesn’t seem as though — well, that 
any one else would like it. Why don’t you write a 
story, Kenneth — just a simple little story?” 

“Humph! nonsense! What business have I or 
anyone else to write ‘just a simple little story’ in 
times when the whole world is starving! No, I 
tell you, it is unspeakably heartless, even immoral, 


4 6 


GOD’S REBEL, 


to write or read mere love-stories when so many are 
suffering for the bare necessaries of life. Can any 
one think to-day that life is such a simple senseless 
skit wherein love is of more importance than light, 
or air, or food, or sunshine? And yet, just read 
two centuries’ yield of fiction — or ask any servant 
girl ! Their unanimity will be amazing. No, I shall 
publish something that will do the world some good 
— or I shall publish nothing.” He drew on his over- 
coat and caught up his hat and manuscript, with the 
customary “Good-by” and the assurance in his every 
manner that some publisher would surely want it 
before night. 

Fortunately, perhaps, he had friends who had 
lately embarked in the publishing business and who 
might possibly facilitate his quest ; true, they had so 
far published nothing but fiction, but this was no 
reason why they might not invest in a more solid 
form of literature if something of worth were 
submitted. So to this firm, known favourably as 
the O. G. Goldsmith-Smith Publishing Company, he 
went first and stated his business. 

The proprietor, Mr. O. G. Goldsmith-Smith him- 
self, was not in; but Mr. Samuel Kent was, and 
moreover, the opinion prevailed that this young 
gentleman was the actual pilot of the firm’s doubtful 
fortunes. 

“You said it was on economics and not fiction, 
Dr. Moore, I believe?” said the publisher. 

Kenneth nodded. Mr. Kent really did not appear 
elated at the chance. 

“Of course,” he explained, “we are in the pub- 
lishing business to make money and would be glad 
to invest in any book in which we can see a profit. 
But I regret to say, Dr. Moore, that the reading 
public does not seem to care for economics, though 
personally it is a subject in which I am profoundly 


SAFEGUARDS OF LITERATURE. 47 

interested. However, such is the barren, pitiable 
fact; the public is seeking amusement, not instruc- 
tion, even though the latter were to save it from 
destruction.” 

“I am sorry,” Kenneth stammered slowly, “but 
of course I thank you for your perfect frankness. 
Still, such books are published now and then. You 
might, perhaps, tell me what houses to call on. 
Would it be too much trouble to give me a few ad- 
dresses ?” 

“Oh, no, it’s no trouble at all, I assure you,” said 
Kent. “But, honestly, I don’t know. A book on 
economics is about the last thing that any publisher 
cares to accept.” He halted a moment, then added : 
“You might call on McBugle & Dunn. I used to be 
with them, and occasionally we would get out such 
a book. Still, knowing the character of your work 
in the university, Dr. Moore, I feel safe in saying 
that the books on economics published by McBugle 
& Dunn are certainly not such as are in accord with 
your sentiments.” 

Kenneth glanced at him quickly. “I suppose not. 
Very few of such books are,” he sighed. “Unfor- 
tunately, Mr. Kent, the average work on economics 
is of such stuff best calculated to appease that por- 
tion of the community which still believes in a pro- 
tective tariff and the immaculate conception.” 

Kent laughed. “That is too true; plenty of 
money for the few and an abundance of faith for 
the masses. That’s what you imply — is it not? 
However, if you will leave your manuscript with 
me I shall be glad to see if I cannot interest some 
one in it. Mr. Goldsmith-Smith may think differ- 
ently.” And as Kenneth thanked him and rose to 
leave, he asked: “How is Mabel?” 

The professor thanked him courteously, replying 
that she was well, and invited him to call. “And 


48 


GOD’S REBEL . 


bring Smith along with you,” he urged. “He has 
never called since our marriage.” 

Kent apologized. “O. G. Goldsmith-Smith,” said 
he, “is keeping his nose to the grindstone nowadays 
writing love-stories. Yes, I shall be delighted to 
persuade him to take an evening off some time. 
Good-by. I shall do all I can for your manuscript, 
I assure you.” 

When Mr. Goldsmith-Smith entered the office a 
half hour later Kent passed the manuscript over to 
him, watching him skip through it the while In his 
twenty-fifth year, Oliver G. Goldsmith-Smith was 
one of those rare youths, favoured of the immortals, 
who are frequently referred to as “rising.” With a 
happy turn for the conventional, a flowing and easy 
style, and a taste for society, he addicted himself to 
the writing of love-stories. When his uncle died 
he inherited a snug little fortune, the only condi- 
tion being that he should adopt his uncle's name in 
connection with his own. A matter of easy ac- 
complishment, obviously; but no, such proved not 
the case, for his uncle's name being itself Gold- 
smith-Smith, it refused for many a puzzling day 
to be satisfactorily incorporated with his own. At 
first thought the young man had intended merely 
to doff his Oliver and go under the plain demo- 
cratic cognomen of Goldsmith Smith, but on so in- 
forming his uncle's attorney that worthy had ob- 
jected. 

“No, Mr. Smith, that will not fulfil the specifica- 
tions outlined, defined and designated in this will. 
You must couple your uncle’s name with your own !” 

“The devil !” he cried in dismay. “Do you mean 
to say I must call myself Oliver Goldsmith-Smith- 
Goldsmith-Smith ?” 

The lawyer’s head wagged, sapiently. “It is so 
nominated in the bond,” said he. “Still, I think we 


SAFEGUARDS OF LITERATURE. 49 

might effect a compromise on one surname, per- 
haps.” 

“Thanks!” and Smith slid out. He was a little 
fellow, fat and chubby, and the weight of all that 
name seemed to fall upon his head like a mountain. 
When he stepped into the elevator on the eighteenth 
floor the machine seemed scarcely more than a para- 
chute to him in his descent to terra firma. Even 
then he felt dizzy and sick at the stomach ; he went 
home and to bed all that day, and all through the 
long dark hours of the night he sat bolt upright 
between the sheets, shaking his fist and swearing 
at the incubus that hovered round him. Oh, it 
would drive him into a madhouse in six months ! 

However, the money helped to tide him over ; his 
convalescence was rapid; and instead of going in- 
sane there was scarcely a magazine of any worth 
and circulation in the whole country that had not 
made demands upon him for stories signed by that 
golden-linked, hyphenated and hybrid name. He 
was the fad for a time; the fluency of his pen was 
nothing in comparison with that of his name ; which 
is in no wise remarkable in this Golden Age of litera- 
ture wherein more famous names, perhaps, than 
Goldsmith-Smith’s have written poorer tales at a 
shilling the word. Not only this, but he had lately 
become his own publisher, and with his own maga- 
zine wherein to advertise and properly review his 
stories. 

“Sam,” said he to Kent, glancing up from the 
manuscript finally, “do you mean to say you’ve ac- 
cepted this?” 

Kent shook his head without looking up. “No, 
Oliver, not yet,” he replied. 

“Urn! I’m glad of that. I don’t like it.” 

“Read it through, Oliver. It may do you good.” 

Hearing Kent speak, one might have marked him 


50 


GOD’S REBEL. 


as a person who weighed his words carefully and 
with a nice regard to their application. It was 
habit, perhaps ; for he was a man half through life 
who until quite recently had been diverted with little 
of its lighter and brighter side. Having said good- 
by to his country home at the age of fourteen, he 
had fought for over twenty years, boy and man, his 
own way in the mercantile life of the city, begin- 
ning as an errand boy in one of the large publishing 
houses, afterwards a wrapper and packer, and, 
finally, a book salesman on the floor of the retail 
department. In this manner six years slipped by 
without his realising any particular lack in his 
education; but at this point he saw that he could 
go no further unless — well, he would speak to the 
manager about it. 

“How old were you when you left school, Sam ?” 
asked that worthy, carelessly, deigning not to look 
up from his desk. 

“Nearly fourteen, sir/’ he had answered, truth- 
fully. 

“Humph! Well, you better stay on the floor. 
That's the best place for you, Sam. Accustom your- 
self to the stock so you can find any book with your 
eyes shut. That’s all. Yes; that’s the best plan, 
Sam, I assure you.” 

But as the boy moved away, clumsily, the man- 
ager had said to himself: “Poor fellow! it’s a 
pity ; he’s so honest and faithful. But he is ignor- 
ant — hopelessly ignorant! And what is a boy of 
that age to do who has no education and is forced 
to work from early to late for his living?” 

But Sam had answered the question in toto: for 
the following eight years, at a period when a young 
man is generally supposed to be enjoying himself, 
Sam Kent was striving sedulously to get some 
learning into that hopelessly ignorant mind of his. 


SAFEGUARDS OF LITERATURE. 


51 

A sorry task at first, especially when half his wages 
must be sent home every week to help pay expenses 
and keep up the interest on a mortgaged farm whose 
land was alleged to be playing out or whose crops 
were ceasing to be of any value. But he did it ; he 
lived on little or nothing, yet managed to keep him- 
self neatly dressed all the time ; whilst the capital 
that he had saved up was truly enormous. Aye, 
Nature has her compensations for those who care 
to pay the price, he would sometimes bethink him- 
self, with a smile; all capital need not be necessarily 
derived by the sweating of the many for the sole 
interest of a few idle spendthrifts, and, though Sam’s 
capital was all in his head, it is possible that if more 
of this same kind were being stored up the other 
base and yellow would soon cease to be either a 
power or a torment in the world at large. A few 
hundred books which represented but a fraction of 
the number studied; classical and modern diction- 
aries, grammars, histories, general literature, and, 
lastly, complete and beautiful sets of Ruskin, Car- 
lyle and Emerson, Darwin and Rousseau, — these 
might have stood for capital in the eyes of the sec- 
ond-hand man round the corner, or of Sam’s land- 
lady had she at any time become afraid lest Sam 
should default on his board. But she wasn’t — he 
had been with her too long. 

Ten years from the time Sam had been advised to 
“stay on the floor,” the manager called him to his 
desk to have a little conversation with him. He 
had noticed that Sam was buying a great many 
books; he had become curious over the matter to 
the extent of detailing a clerk to check over Sam’s 
account and give him an inventory of the stock that 
had been charged and paid for by him. The result 
was surprising. He wondered what that young 
fellow was doing with all those books. Was he 


52 


GOD’S REBEL . 


starting another book-store somewhere to rival their 
own ? He would call Sam up and find out. 

He found out. From a five minutes’ chat it went 
on to a quarter of an hour, a half, a full hour, and 
again another. When Sam finally left him with a 
smile and a clasp of the hand, the manager gave 
himself a good pinch on the arm, and then on the 
thigh. “Good Lord, am I dreaming?” he asked 
aloud. “Why, that fellow knows more than I do, 
and I am a graduate of Yale College!” 

Ah, it was all very impudent of Sam; nay, im- 
pious ! “Shall a college education not suffice a man 
for his lifetime? My diploma is still framed and 
hanging !” 

The following day Sam took his place on the edi- 
torial staff in the publishing department. 

But if Nature gives fair compensation she also 
sends just retribution ; every obverse has its reverse ; 
every systole its diastole; every sweet its bitter. 
Ten years, ten years ! of how little significance they 
seemed when chatting to the manager for an idle 
two hours! That first half-dozen books on language 
and mathematics, how painful were the first two 
years in which he was striving to master them ! How 
dumb and thick-headed he had been; why, he had 
had to call in his landlady’s fifteen-year-old boy to 
assist him! Not till the end of five years did his 
gray-matter begin to acquire form and perfection, 
the nervous elements to build their railroads and 
ramifications so that when an idea should strike him 
from any source it would have a proper conveyance 
to travel by and suitable accommodations at the end 
of the route. And the temptations — what a tug it 
had taken at the time to resist them ! Senseless fol- 
lies for the greater part, perhaps; yet to a young 
man of red blood, and health, and action, tired of 
the daily routine and the never ending drill at night 


SAFEGUARDS OF LITERATURE . 53 

it had been none too easy at first when beset on 
every hand by his companions. Quiet, modest, unas- 
suming, he was a favourite despite himself until the 
last one had deserted and given him up in despair. 
“Come along, Sam; there’s going to be a mill at the 
Athletic to-night.” “Thanks, I have a mill of my 
own to grind.” “Come on, old man, we are going 
to paint the town to-night.” But again he refused; 
he had a little painting of his own to do, a little 
interior work with John Ruskin. Until all his old 
acquaintances finally dropped him, saying that he 
was an ass, and an idiot, that he had thrown away 
his youth, and was as dried up as a piece of old 
leather. 

And very likely he was;, we shall have no ar- 
gument over him. Especially as no one but God 
is ever alleged to have said on beholding the semi- 
completion of a man : “He is very good !” Which 
implies that the Deity must have been easy to sat- 
isfy, or else that it requires wisdom little short of 
omniscience in this evolutionary age to say so much 
of any man, of any puppet, and of poor old Adam 
least of all. 

Several years more passed, and Sam was becom- 
ing known as a critic. Personally, his few acquain- 
tances loved him ; but the mass of people in general 
hated him heartily for what he had to say about 
books, and people, and things. They declared that 
he was a cynic, and moreover that he knew nothing 
at all of that life which he arrogantly presumed to 
criticise. The final retort reached his heart. In 
fencing with a truthful man, there is no instrument 
so potent to disarm him as that of his own. Liars 
in general know this, and are quick to take novel 
advantage of it in ridding themselves, by means of a 
truthful prick, of an honest antagonist who were 


54 GOD’S REBEL . 

otherwise invulnerable. Then they go on lying 
again. 

“Mrs. Brady,” said Sam, one day, to his land- 
lady. “I’m going to live at the Oxford Club.” 

Mrs. Brady dropped her pancake knife. “Lord 
save us, Mr. Sam! Whatever shall I do?” She did 
so enjoy browning those cakes for “Mr. Sam.” 

“Oh, that’ll be all right, Mrs. Brady,” he assured 
her; “I shall keep my room here just as it is, books 
and everything; and sometimes I shall come over 
and see th — and see you,” and he swallowed his 
mouthful. “That was a very fine cake, Mrs. Brady.” 

She glowed gratefully. “Mr. Sam” was always 
so good to her; he had eaten seven that morning. 
And to think that it must be the last! 

But that was two years ago. Sam was now a 
member of the Oxford in good standing, keeping 
his dues paid and his shoes polished, and trying to 
make himself fit into his dress suit whilst familiar- 
izing himself with the details of that profound sub- 
ject of which he was so hopelessly ignorant, to wit, 
polite society. And it must be confessed — with 
weakness, with mortification — that the first night 
he had gone out with fear and trembling, and re- 
turned in confusion; and the next time, and the 
next, — and the next. Yes, he knew he was foolish 
and unreasonable, but how under the heavens was 
he, Sam Kent, ever to become so easy, so graceful, 
so gracious and natural as those charming folk in 
Chicago, who from their youth up had worn dia- 
monds and said “haven’t saw?” Why, it was a 
world of its own, with habits and instincts of its 
own, it must be studied sui generis; yet how had he 
dared to touch it, to come into it, with rude hands, 
with barbarian feet, and with impious lips ! Oh, it 
was shameful, profane — society ought to have mur- 
dered him! 


SAFEGUARDS OF LITERATURE. 55 

But that was only the first season. During the 
second, doubt entered his brain; by the third he 
was a skeptic confirmed, and at the age of thirty- 
seven — but looking ten years younger; dark hair, 
melancholic eyes, mesmeric moustache — he was 
one of those most provoking of beaus, a cynic who 
laughed in a quiet, refined, and wholly dispassionate 
way, ruthlessly smashing your Parian gods and 
directly building you one out of plaster to take its 
place, whilst alleging all the time that it was the 
most beautiful until you agreed with him in spite 
of yourself — “only it all seemed so strange!” sim- 
pered Miss Susan. Yet a negative pole withal, but 
one that surely did not repel; who danced — some 
said indifferently, others well; but who at all times 
chatted delightfully in a pensive, half-amused, 
world-weary way that was declared to be perfectly 
charming by mamma and maiden and miss, but who 
was himself strangely and blissfully unconscious of 
it all. 

At the Oxford Sam had won the acquaintance 
and esteem of Mr. O. G. Goldsmith-Smith. The 
latter had learned within a few days after Sam’s 
entrance into their midst that Sam was a critic; 
it therefore behooved him to make his acquaintance, 
for as likely as not Sam would be criticising one 
of his books some day. Of course he expected crit- 
icism, wanted it, in fact, but then, the critic might 
as well be decent about it. “I don’t pretend to be 
Shakspere, you know.” Hence he had taken Sam 
under his wing, had introduced him, taught him 
how to bowl and play pool, and those thousand-and- 
one little trifles about a necktie, a dress suit, and so- 
ciety, which everyone may be supposed to know, but 
which, after all, are a long way from being intuitive 
and were not as plain as Greek to Sam Kent. And 
the latter had appreciated these offices to the full; 


GOD’S REBEL. 


56 

Mr. O. G. Goldsmith-Smith had saved him from 
being a boor, had made a gentleman of him, had 
come as Pharaoh’s daughter, and plucked him, a 
thumb-sucking Moses, out of the miasmatic bul- 
rushes and prepared a place for him in the king’s 
house. 

Naturally he was grateful; it was one of those 
debts that he felt he could never repay. He managed 
to stammer his sense of appreciation, awkwardly, 
towards the close of the first season. 

“Oh, don’t mention it, my dear fellow,” Mr. 
Goldsmith-Smith had responded, airily. “Of course, 
I’ve spent a little time on you, a few spare moments 
that I might otherwise have put in my manuscript, — 
but by Jove ! I’ll tell you what you can do for me, if 
you want to?” 

“Name it.” 

“I’ll read you my latest story; let you criticise it.” 

It was kind ; it was ingenuous ; and Sam agreed 
gladly on one condition, which was that he must read 
the story to himself, and alone. In no other way 
could he do it justice. “Leave a wide margin, my 
boy,” he suggested pleasantly. 

“Oh, yes; I always do that, you know, Sam. 
It looks better. By Jove! I pity those poor devils 
who can’t afford to use paper freely and bunch their 
words from one edge until they turn a corner on 
the next. A beautiful strip of white margin is what 
I love.” 

But when his manuscript had come back from 
Sam, with that erstwhile beautiful white margin, 
that sandy desert, all filled with strange and incom- 
prehensible words and turns and quirks, with what 
looked to be a new town-site actually laid off in the 
northwest corner of the fifteenth page, and various 
trunk lines running to it from every point of the 
compass and more too, the entire area blossoming 


SAFE G UARDS OF LI TER A TURE. 57 

wi-th a rare and exotic growth in red, in blue, and 
in black, — ah, what in the devil did it all mean? 
And that word ! he had noticed it on several pages, 
why in the deuce couldn’t he write so a civilised per- 
son could read ! Ah, here it is again, and he spelled 
it out: “F-l-a-p-do- flapdoodle. Flapdoodle! By 
Jove! Does he mean to insult me? Damned if I 
don’t get him to put on the gloves to-night! He 
doesn’t call that criticism, does he? Flapdoodle!” 

But at the end of a week he thought better of it. 
He forgave Sam freely. After all, Sam was ten 
years his elder — and a head taller! As he studied 
over the margin the sixth time he began to be aware 
of Sam’s ability. Of what infinite suggestiveness 
was his every mark ! All it required was skill and 
good eyesight and that manuscript-story would yet 
be one of the most remarkable literary productions of 
the age. He determined some day to hire a surveyor 
and together they would rewrite it in accordance 
with Sam’s drawings and specifications. 

Thus it followed that, a year or so ago, when Mr. 
Goldsmith-Smith decided to enter a wider field of 
literary labour and usefulness than he had hitherto 
embraced, namely, book publisher and sole pro- 
prietor of a semi-monthly publication, the Literary 
Sun, he found himself in need of skilled assistance. 
Not at first, though; oh, no, not at first. At the 
start he felt that he could easily carry the entire 
burden of the business with the aid of a couple of 
stenographers. But it didn’t go ; his criticisms were 
not acceptable. Certain jealous contemporaries had 
a way of calling him “Phaeton” Smith, and making 
invidious observations on the erratic course of the 
sun. Accordingly he had gone to Sam and begged 
him to come and “steer the Sun ” for him and at a 
salary in keeping with the dignity of that glorious 
office; with the result that at the end of three 


GOD’S REBEL. 


58 

months their semi-monthly publication was ceasing 
to be called by the derisive name of “Smith’s Moon,” 
and was beginning to glow with authentic effulgence. 

“It seems to me, Sam,” said Oliver, laying aside 
the manuscript “that Dr. Kenneth Moore has some 
very peculiar ideas. No, I don’t think we can afford 
to publish anything of this kind. He puts a false 
colour on life ; is an egotist of the darkest dye.” 

And he laid aside the manuscript with a sigh, 
as if for valuable time utterly wasted in its perusal. 


CHAPTER VI. 

SUPERSTITION AND FACT 

“You believe, then, that I could put the money 
to better purpose, do you, Kenneth ?” 

“Oh, yes; I am positive you can. You see how 
it is, Mr. Ludington, the university is in no 
particular need of funds to further the cause of 
higher education. Indeed, education of that kind 
is about the last thing on earth that our people are 
suffering for. Mr. Rockland furnishes plenty of 
money for that sort of thing, you know — for scaH 
tering human intelligence and obscuring real issues 
and vital necessities.” 

Mr. Ludington frowned. “You are not very 
loyal, Kenneth, it seems to me, to the principles of 
your institution.” 

The younger man’s eyes gleamed, and he leaned 
forward in his chair as he replied. “No, Mr. Lud- 
ington, I’m not loyal to that mistaken philanthropy. 
I despise it for its wickedness and duplicity. Why, 
if one-tenth of the money that is now given for the 
cause of so-called higher education were applied in 
a business-like manner to the economic relief of 


SUPERSTITION AND FACT , 


59 

humanity, poverty would be banished from our land 
within the next two or three years.” 

“Charity — is that what you mean ?” 

“Oh, no, good heavens, no! What I mean, Mr. 
Ludington, is that if you will take this money you 
contemplate giving to the university and apply it to 
the purchase of land and the erection of suitable 
factories for the unemployed here in the outskirts of 
this city, in two or three years we shall have no un- 
employed — people will no longer need to beg for the 
merest right to work and live.” 

Mr. Ludington started. “Ah, you mean I might 
erect a poorhouse, my lad ? Humph ! I don’t quite 
fancy the notion, somehow.” 

Kenneth smiled. “No, Mr. Ludington,” he 
urged, patiently, “you don’t appreciate the fact that 
the poorhouse, as we know it to-day, is an exclusive 
institution designed simply for chronic paupers. 
On the other hand, young and able-bodied men and 
women honestly seeking work have no place to 
turn — they must starve or commit suicide. It is 
my firm conviction that our American cities must 
establish shops and farms for this constantly grow- 
ing class of people where they may support them- 
selves decently and respectably, without disgrace. 
Well, if our cities refuse to take action in this matter 
our rich men must. It is the crying need of the hour. 
Wouldn’t you feel like initiating this movement, 
sir?” 

Mr. Ludington said nothing. It was not pleas- 
ant to be balked in this manner with the bold state- 
ment that his contemplated gift of one hundred thou- 
sand dollars to the Rockland University was un- 
wise, ill-advised, even wrong, in the face of a starv- 
ing humanity. As everyone knew, philanthropic peo- 
ple had been satisfying that innate desire for the 
esteem of their fellow-beings in this manner for 


6o 


GOD'S REBEL . 


hundreds of years, and hitherto none had dared 
question such beneficence. But now, here was this 
young man, with his head full of all kinds of vis- 
ionary schemes, telling him that there was more 
necessity for municipal work-shops just at present 
than for furthering scientific speculations on the 
evidences of life and Christianity on the planet 
Mars. He had hoped to endow the astronomical 
department. 

“You know, Kenneth,” he protested, quietly 
stroking his white side-whiskers, “that despite my 
long friendship with your father, we always differed 
sadly over what are called the questions of the hour. 
Such have never interested me, I may say, chiefly, 
perhaps, because I feel that such questions always 
right themselves best in the course of time, hence it 
is worse than idle for a man to fret over them.” 

“Yes, I know,” answered Kenneth gravely, again 
leaning back in his chair. “It is a very comfortable 
philosophy, this one of laissez faire. Under its rest- 
ful influence all that any man need do is to stay at 
home and read Herbert Spencer and let the evils go 
on gathering force till they overthrow themselves by 
their own weight. Meanwhile you believe in fur- 
nishing aid to animal and vegetable life, to art, 
education, science — but when it comes to starving 
humanity you say peremptorily : ‘Leave it alone !’ ” 

Again the old gentleman was taken aback; and 
noting it, Kenneth added hastily: “Believe me, 
Uncle Amos, I do not question your goodness of 
heart in all this, but simply your methods. It all 
comes from your isolation — you fail to see the hun- 
gry, miserable world as it is. This is probably why 
you differed from my father, whose life brought him 
into such intimate relations with the people. How- 
ever, if you will consent to come with me a few 
hours this afternoon, I am confident that you will 


SUPERSTITION AND FACT 


6 1 


be able to see with your own eyes that everyday life 
itself invites your assistance quite as much as the 
cause of higher education.” 

It was the day named by Dr. Griggs ; and though 
Kenneth had been apprehensive all along lest some- 
thing might happen at the last moment to prevent 
that gentleman from keeping his appointment, he 
had scarcely won Mr. Ludington’s consent to accom- 
pany them when his door bell rang and Dr. Griggs 
came in. There were yet evidences on his coun- 
tenance of wavering, suffering, and self-restraint, 
and when he gave Kenneth his hand it was some- 
what too much as though he had said : 

“Well, do with me what you wish. I shall try and 
stand it — for three hours !” 

Twenty minutes later they were passing in with 
the crowd at one of the doors of the mammoth de- 
partment stores of Moses, Jones and Co., which was 
perhaps the most ultra-fashionable store of the city. 
Its trade was enormous; everyone marvelled how 
it could sell goods of such excellent quality at such 
ridiculously low prices. It was a fascinating ques- 
tion, and one that Kenneth had studied with con- 
stantly widening interest. One saw on every hand 
how dozens of small competitors had been forced to 
close their doors one after another, whereas this 
store, with three or four of its kind, had gone on 
increasing its space, adding story to story and mul- 
tiplying its revenues despite the ominous mutterings 
of its bankrupt rivals, who had organised themselves 
into a “business-men’s association” to protest against 
this new and dangerous machine in retail industry. 

“You do not believe in department-stores, I sup- 
pose, Professor Moore?” asked Dr. Griggs, un- 
certainly, himself glancing around with approval. 

Kenneth turned; they were standing at the mo- 
ment in the cloak department where various stylish 


62 


GOD’S REBEL. 


garments were displayed at hitherto unheard of 
prices. “Oh, yes,” he replied; “you see the depart- 
ment-store is simply a gigantic machine, after all. 
It might be of great service and benefit to the public. 
However, like all other machinery to-day, instead of 
simplifying the problem of existence, it has obvi- 
ously made it only the more difficult for some people 
to exist at all. The owners of the machine become 
wealthier and the slaves who operate it starve. I 
wanted you to see these cloaks. Please note them 
closely. We will now go where they are made.” 

It was already past four o’clock, and, being late 
in the fall, the day was beginning to darken. After 
waiting some time on a street corner a car came 
along, much too small for the crowd, but they en- 
tered ; considering themselves fortunate at being per- 
mitted to pay their fare and hang on to a strap all 
the way. 

“Dear me ! does this car always smell like this ?” 
asked Dr. Griggs in disgust. “It’s an outrage; the 
company ought to be arrested!” 

“Unfortunately, it’s not the car that smells, but 
the people. They never wash — it is too expensive.” 

“Never wash? My goodness! Won’t we catch 
some disease ? That’s an awful smell !” 

The passengers were mostly working people, men 
and women, of various nationalities. Two sisters 
of some pessimistic religious order sat near the 
stove, their eyes fastened on two little books 
in black flexible leather covers stamped with 
a gilt cross. Their lips moved inaudibly, 
automatically; they saw nothing, heard nothing, 
smelled nothing. What was the use — was not their 
religion sufficient? They could not change the world 
if they tried; moreover no one was supposed to be 
happy in this world, and as for bad smells — well, 
things would smell better in the next world, too; 


SUPERSTITION AND FACT. 


63 

that is, if nothing got burnt ! Though to Kenneth 
it was always a source of mingled amusement and 
indignation to observe how this so-called Christianity 
had so steeped the people in the very dregs of pes- 
simism that they were mostly content to' leave this 
world to the devil and the capitalists, whilst vainly 
pinning their only hopes of happiness on some vision- 
ary realm of God and the dead. 

As for Mr. Ludington, he merely stood there 
clinging to the strap whilst the car bumped slowly 
onward, wondering vaguely why it was that this 
young man, the son of his old friend, had chosen a 
profession that could only keep him in hot water 
all his life when he might have selected something 
more comfortable. 

Quitting the car, they made their way down a 
swarming cross street whose every dilapidated 
frame building, crowded from basement to ceiling, 
bore witness to the poverty of the community 
Women passed, carrying great bundles in their arms 
and on their heads; and children, children that 
swarmed ! Little tots scarcely able to walk, streamed 
past with pails and pitchers, dodging into the first 
convenient saloon. In front of one of these places 
stood a white-haired old man playing the violin. 
A moment before he had been singing, now he was 
playing the Marseillaise. He played it well, with 
considerable feeling. 

Kenneth handed him a quarter, and they passed 
on. 

The old man turned and looked after him in as- 
tonishment, with curious wonder. It may have been 
the size of the tip. 

“Ah, it’s such a pity, professor,” sighed Dr. 
Griggs, “that the saloon should be the most inviting 
spot in all this region. It is this awful drinking that 
makes poverty.” 


64 


GOD'S REBEL . 


But the professor shook his head. “I beg your 
pardon, sir, but I can’t agree with you. For example, 
if you were passing along the street some dark night, 
Dr. Griggs, and should meet two men who com- 
manded you to halt and throw up your hands, one 
of the men rifling your pockets whilst the other 
offered you a glass of beer, would it make any differ- 
ence whether you drank the beer or not so far as 
having your pocket picked is concerned? No; in 
all fairness you would thank the good Samaritan 
who offered you the drink. Well, that is the way it 
is with these poor people. Society has picked their 
pockets ever since they were born — you will see how 
it is done.” 

A moment later they were climbing the shaky 
stairs to the top floor of one of those tumble-down 
tenements. At the landing their ears were greeted 
by the clatter and whirr of sewing-machines, inter- 
rupted perhaps for a second, and then flying on faster 
than ever, as though seeking wildly to overtake the 
little moment that had been lost. There was no 
name on the door, but knowing the place, Kenneth 
knocked. 

A little old man, racial in every manner and fea- 
ture, opened the door part way and looked out. “Ah, 
it is Mr. Moore,” he said with characteristic accent. 
“You wish to come in?” 

“If you please, Mr. Exstein,” answered Kenneth. 
“Are you still at work on those cloaks for Moses, 
Jones and Co. ?” 

The old man grinned and held the door open. “Oh 
ya, it vas a fine gontract.” He had bid the lowest of 
anyone ; too low, in fact. However, all his workers 
would now be forced to toil sixteen hours daily in- 
stead of fourteen. This would be sure to leave a 
small broilt; then Moses, Jones and Co. would have 
a very good broilt, too, and the poor fashionable peo- 


SUPERSTITION AND FACT. 


65 


pie would get their clothes so cheap ! Ah, it was all 
a wonderful system — this brofit system ! It made the 
rich richer and the poor poorer. By-and-by the 
poorest wDuld die and become straightway the rich- 
est in heaven. Such was the great gomfort of 
Gristianity ! 

After this manner the old man complained, whilst 
they filed through a dark passage to an inner room 
perhaps thirty feet square where fully fifty men, 
women and children of all ages sat working. There 
was a nervous intensity on their faces and in their 
every act; the entrance of the visitors excited no 
attention, no remark; they were intent wholly on 
finishing those elegant broadcloth coats for Moses, 
Jones and Co. One child — she might have been 
twelve years old — was wearing one of the garments 
whilst she worked on another. The room was dimly 
lighted with oil lamps, and was heated only with a 
cook-stove at the farther end of the room where an 
old woman stood stirring an unsavoury kettle. 

Dr. Griggs sniffed the atmosphere suspiciously. 
If possible, it was worse than that street car. 

“Do these people eat here, Kenneth ?” queried Mr. 
Ludington, in evident distress at the sight. 

The professor nodded. “Of course; they can do 
nothing else; they scarcely go away day or night. 
They are no longer free agents. This is one of 
those hells written of by Charles Kingley fifty years 
ago, in Alton Locke , when the people in this coun- 
try were congratulating themselves that we had no 
industrial horrors of the sort that put England to 
shame. Well, you perceive we are to-day exactly 
where England was at that time.” 

He spoke in low tones, gravely, repressing his feel- 
ings as best he might. The machines clattered on ; 
anon some toiler changed his position slightly, and 
for an instant the visitors would be aware of a 


66 


GOD’S REBEL . 


mute, wondering gaze fixed upon them as if ques- 
tioning dully how it was that some people could 
find the time to watch other people toil. At one of 
these moments the eye of a woman near by caught 
Kenneth’s, and, smiling in recognition, he turned 
to his companions — 

“You see that woman over there, working here 
— with her four children ?” 

Dr. Griggs was indignant. “Yes, yes, professor,” 
he cried impatiently, “but why don’t they quit it? 
Why under heavens don’t they walk out of this hole 
and keep out ! No one compels them to stay, I sup- 
pose ?” 

That there was anything childish, even foolish in 
this question doubtless did not occur to the min- 
ister. If people didn’t like to work at one thing, let 
them do something else. Such had always been his 
philosophy, and he found it adequate for all occa- 
sions. 

“She will probably be able to answer you better 
than I can,” said Kenneth, as they moved across 
to the little group. He had known her for some 
time. For months past he had been trying to find 
a place for them in the world outside the sweat-shop. 
He had not succeeded. 

“Ah, why don’t we leave here — is that what you 
asked, sir?” she said, wearily, without pausing in 
her work as she replied to Dr. Griggs’ query follow- 
ing his kindly greeting. “Perhaps you think it is 
because we are not fit for anything else. Well, I 
can’t tell you; I don’t know. You should have 
asked Carl. The professor knew him — my oldest 
boy, he was fourteen. Ah, it was Carl who meant 
to get us all out of here — if he had lived.” She 
looked up, helplessly, her eyes suddenly wet with 
tears. “Carl thought to find work outside. He 
believed as you do, sir, that God is good to the world ; 


SUPERSTITION AND FACT 


67 


that there is more than enough for every living 
being, and that it is man only who is cruel and fool- 
ish. Someone told him of the great fruit crops 
across the lake, and how pickers were needed. So 
he left here in the middle of summer and made his 
way to the farms. But when he got there, poor boy ! 
the farmers had stopped picking ; all their men had 
been discharged and the fruit was rotting on the 
ground. There was so much fruit that it did not 
pay to pick it — and we here in the shop, we had only 
broth and black bread !” 

She paused a moment, thoughtfully, whilst Dr. 
Griggs admitted during the interval that such con- 
ditions of overproduction were really most unfor- 
tunate, most deplorable. “It upsets all the estab- 
lished laws of trade and causes much unavoidable 
suffering, I have no doubt,” said he consolingly. 

The woman glanced at him a moment, then con- 
tinued: “And so Carl, after begging for work from 
house to house and finding nothing, finally came 
back and took up his old work. But he had always 
been so full of hope, so eager; but now he was dis^ 
appointed and discouraged. He began to brood over 
it, having seen that it was not because of any real 
lack of food that the world suffered, but by reason of 
foolish customs. There was bread and meat and 
fruit more than enough for everyone, he used to 
say, but the poor people could not get any, couldn’t 
even find work enough to enable them to buy it of 
the rich who owned it. And thinking of it so, and 
talking with some of the men here in the shop, Carl 
became a socialist ; he saw no other way by which 
any of us could ever get out of here.” 

“Dear me! a socialist!” repeated Dr. Griggs 
aghast. “But my good woman, wasn’t your boy a 
Christian? Did he never pray?” 

She shook her head. “Pray? What good woul'd 


68 


GOD’S REBEL . 


that do?” she asked. “You pray to Go*d to put 
new strength in the sun and new vigour in the soil 
in order that you may have more bountiful crops, 
more wheat, more meat, more fruit, when you al- 
ready have too much and complain of overproduc- 
tion! No; Carl thought it was blasphemy to mock 
God in that way. The more God answers such 
prayers the harder it becomes for the poor to live 
at all.” 

Doctor Griggs said nothing ; this was a most ap- 
palling discovery. Of course he knew it couldn’t 
be true ; the unfortunate woman’s brain was proba- 
bly crazed. However, he ventured no reply; he 
wanted time to think it over. He knew in general 
that overproduction was one of the worst things 
that could befall the world, and began to wonder 
dimly if it wouldn’t be wiser to pray God to stop 
being bountiful and send us a famine instead. Still, 
such were a most anomalous prayer; he could not 
quite decide the matter — not yet. 

The woman was crying, softly; he seemed un- 
able to find words to console her. They moved 
away to the further end of the room where an old 
man was pressing the cloaks. 

“What became of that woman’s boy, professor?” 
he asked finally, unable to conceal the uncomfortable 
impression the story had made. 

“Who, Carl? I beg your pardon, I thought she 
told you that he committed suicide.” 

“What! that child? Only fourteen years old!” 

Kenneth made no reply. He might have ex- 
plained how the boy Carl was brighter than the 
average; how he had longed to become a leader 
and guide his people out of bondage ; how in order 
to do this he knew that he must first have an educa- 
tion, and how this for him was impossible; how 
the hours had become constantly longer and longer ; 


SUPERSTITION AND FACT , 69 

how people with such temperaments are sometimes 
crazed by the pressure, the mountains of impossi- 
bility — children especially; how the best were de- 
stroyed and the most brutal and stolid survived. But 
he said nothing. If Dr. Griggs were honest he 
could see these things for himself, as no one could 
tell him. 

They spoke to others of the workers, receiving 
in general courteous replies, save for one who re- 
sented the tone of one of the minister’s queries 
somewhat bitterly. “Oh, yes ; we are here because 
we like it, of course ; it is such a nice place to work 
and the hours and surroundings are so pleasant. We 
can any of us leave when we choose ; all we need to 
do is to find work somewhere else. We all have the 
same opportunities; it is a free country.” 

It was past six o’clock, and, though the workers 
showed no sign of ceasing, Kenneth and his party 
were on the point of leaving when there came a 
loud peremptory knock at the door. The old man 
who had admitted them opened it, and a policeman 
entered. He was attired in very fine clothes, and 
had a very red face. He walked unsteadily. 

■ “Look here, now, Mr. Exstein,” he said loudly, 
regardless of the visitors, and with all the aggres- 
siveness of his race clearly heightened by his occu- 
pation, “ye’ve got to have more vintilation here or 
pay me more money. It’s aginst the law to crowd 
the poor divils like this.” 

The embodiment of law and compassion moved 
down the room, scattering his objections as he went. 
If Mr. Eckstein persisted in cooking in this room 
he must pay five dollars a month for “protection.” 
— the policeman had come into his office with the 
republican administration, and manifestly all the 
principles of that glorious party were instinct in his 
being. As for “vintilation,” it would cost Mr. Eck- 


70 


GOD'S REBEL. 


stein two hundred dollars to pay a carpenter to re- 
model the room; the cheaper way would be to pay 
the policeman ten dollars a month. 

“I’ll give you two days to t’ink it over,” said he ; 
whilst the old man wrung his hands in despair, fol- 
lowing him and exclaiming at intervals : “Ach ! Mr. 
Largkins, it vill ruin us. Ve are such boor beebles. 
It can’t be done.” 

“But I say it must be done, Mr. Eckstein. Ye’re 
huntin’ throuble wid the law. It’s for the likes of 
yez that it’s made. By Saint Patrick ! — ” He came 
to a pause, sniffing the atmosphere with sudden dis- 
gust. “I say, me friend,” he continued, reaching 
out with his club and striking a workman on the 
elbow, “what danged dead thing have ye got in 
this room ? Why the devil don’t ye kape clean ?” 

The tailor spoken to was an American by the name 
of Williams, one of the most rapid of workmen and 
usually one of the quietest about the shop. Failing 
to find work elsewhere, he generally appeared to be 
working the harder, as if to drown all consciousness 
of his misfortunes. The policeman’s ungentle in- 
terruption had joggled his arm and caused him to 
prick his finger. He jumped up angrily, dropping 
his work with an oath. 

“Keep clean? you drunken fool!” he shouted. 
“What have we got to do with keeping clean ? Can’t 
you see we are not fed and clothed by the city as 
you are? No ; it’s bread we’re after — bread ! bread ! 
bread! all day and all night! We have no time to 
keep clean!” 

The policeman’s face became purple. “Hush!” 
and he struck the man heavily on the shoulder. “Be 
quiet, now, or I’ll run ye in.” 

Stung by the blow and the threat, without wait- 
ing an instant the tailor snatched up a lamp from his 
sewing-machine and dashed it full in the policeman’s 


SUPERSTITION AND FACT 


7 1 


face. The latter staggered a moment, sought to re- 
cover himself, then fell with a crash to the floor. 
There was a bright flash; every light in the room 
went out with the explosion. The women screamed; 
all rushed headlong for the door. 

“Look out! you can’t get out that way!” 

A sheet of flame shot up to the ceiling, effectually 
cutting off the door and proving that the warning 
had come none too soon. Quickly the crowd turned, 
making for the window in the rear of the shop. 

There was a flat roof ten feet below, upon which 
the women and children were hastily dropped and 
the men followed with the flames at their heels; 
thence by other roofs, scuttles, and dark passages 
to the second story of a neighboring tenement-dwell- 
ing where the firemen in the street below came to 
their assistance. 

“Thank God!” Dr. Griggs exclaimed fervently, 
as they pushed their way out through the crowd. 

“Are you all right, Uncle Amos?” Kenneth asked 
anxiously, and added : “I should never have led 
you into such a fire-trap.” 

The old gentleman shook himself together. “No, 
my lad, I shall be content to take your word for it 
hereafter,” and he laughed. “However, let us be 
thankful we’re out of it. Can you find us a carriage, 
Kenneth ?” 

But they were not out of it yet ; by this time the 
buildings adjoining were wrapped in a flaming 
whirlpool ; men and women rushed hither and 
thither, risking their lives to save those hovels 
of misery and degradation. Slaves know of 
nothing so sacred as shackles; being fettered 
and bound so long, they naturally come to 
feel a respect akin to religion for the thing that 
binds them. Meanwhile a cry rose up from the 
crowd — someone had been left behind in the burn- 


72 


GOD'S REBEL. 


ing shop. “Larkins ! the policeman !” they shouted, 
whilst the firemen fought their way up through the 
flames only to be driven back again and again, till 
at last the building fell in with a crash. A gang of 
policemen could be seen searching the crowd for 
Williams — Williams, the tailor at bay who had 
pricked his finger, who had thrown the lamp; “Will- 
iams the murderer/’ as the people whispered fear- 
fully, whilst still fighting in vain to save some por- 
tion of their paltry belongings that were being ruth- 
lessly consumed as in manifest accordance with that 
divine dictum of “from him that hath nothing even 
that little which he hath shall be taken.” 

“If that man is caught,” said Dr. Griggs, as they 
crowded their way out, “I suppose he will be tried 
and hanged.” Events were plainly too swift for 
him ; doubt struggled up in his voice. 

“Oh, most assuredly,” Kenneth answered with a 
laugh; “the victim is always hanged when caught!” 

At the corner of a street where they passed a 
crowd was gathered in front of a saloon. An old 
man with white hair stood in the center, fiddling the 
Marseillaise. 


CHAPTER VII. 

GOING DOWN! 

“You see, Sam, we can’t afford to accept any more 
manuscript from unknown authors. They don’t pay, 
and it’s time we quit trying to run an eleemosynary 
institution. Now there’s that manuscript of Moore’s 
— you might know he would write in that style ; it’s 
his way. I know him, he was a classmate of mine. 
Confound him! he’s eternally trying to swim be- 
neath the surface, seeing things that other people 


GOING DOWN! 


73 

care nothing about. Well, it’s no use; we can’t pub- 
lish his book.” 

Sam ventured no protest. 

“Of course, old man,” Smith went on, “I’m not 
questioning your judgment at all when it comes to 
determining the true literary worth of a manuscript. 
Not at all ! But there’s that story you liked so well, 
the Rhapsodist, you know ; it was so light, so deli- 
cate, didn’t really seem to go below the surface. 
Well, it ought to have made a hit; but hang it all! 
why didn’t it ? Didn’t we get it out in good shape 
and advertise it in full page descriptions in the Sun 
and other leading journals ? But that’s the way with 
the public — it’s an ass! Why, it’s the way all my own 
books have gone latterly, and can’t I write better now 
than I did at first?” 

“Really, Oliver, I hope so,” Sam agreed without 
looking up from his work. 

“Of course, it stands to reason,” said Oliver, be- 
ginning to stride up and down ; “experience, growth, 
the development of my art, you know, Sam. How- 
ever, I say that we’ve got to fall strictly in line. Not 
another manuscript from a strange author until we 
are rich — and that’s flat!” 

Sam had nothing to say ; that part of the business 
was Oliver’s funeral, he merely gave his advice when 
asked. 

“I wish you would write some letters to-day, 
Sam,” the other continued, “to some of these writers 
whose books are having a run. Offer them whatever 
you like. Still, it’s enough to sour a man on the 
whole miserable occupation, isn’t it, now? I mean 
this buying books from authors with a name, before 
ever the story is conceived. And what kind of 
stuff do they give us in return ? Oh, it’s rotten, rot- 
ten ! Four or five books a year from these famous 
humbugs who reel it out by the yard, and I’ll bet 


74 


GOD’S REBEL . 


any money that there’s better stuff in that pile of 
unavailable over there in the corner. Why, it’s not 
fair; not fair to the unknown whose manuscripts 
come in to the publishing houses only to be piled up 
unread and returned at the end of thirty days with 
a ‘not available’ inside. Sam, if I hadn’t got into 
this devilish publishing business I’d write a book 
myself for once that should go below the surface. 
I’d startle the public with some of these facts. And 
what’s more, if I couldn’t write better than some of 
those fellows whose unborn manuscripts you are so- 
liciting, I shouldn’t write at all — I’d wait for ten 
years until I had an idea.” 

Sam continued his work. “Very praiseworthy, 
Oliver, I’m sure,” he replied. “But I should think 
twice about that if I were you ; ten years is a very 
short time. However, if you say the word, I’ll add 
a postscript to these letters giving them the benefit 
of our editorial opinion — about waiting ten years, I 
mean.” 

“Oh, shut up, Sam ! You know we’ve got to 
live. Ah, and here comes another one !” 

The “other one,” — dreaded, scorned, and avoided 
— closed the door after her and stood a moment 
with feet that hesitated, though her eyes and the 
quick turn of the head seemed to sweep the office 
and take an inventory of its contents at a glance. 
She was a young woman, slightly below the medium 
height; her dress, one noted immediately, was never 
of any style ; whilst her hair, wavy and brown, hung 
almost in ringlets and curls — certainly of an arrange- 
ment to attract attention at once by its obsoleteness. 

Oh, yes, she’s another one all right, Oliver ob- 
served to himself, continuing his march up and 
down. And she’s either from the country, or has 
wheels. She’s too pretty to know anything. Now 
if she would only take that manuscript under her 


GOING DOWN! 


75 


arm, and pile it right over there on top of the un- 
available it would be promptly returned to her at 
the end of thirty days and no questions asked. But 
she won’t ; they never do. Confound this business ! 
it’s ruining my style — that’s what every one says. 
My old publishers even tell me I ought to quit it. 

The girl glanced at the young man pacing up and 
down with his head bent. No, he was certainly not 
the man; but ah, there he was, over at that desk! 
She glided over there; she might have taken one 
step or a dozen, one couldn’t say. Or she might 
have leapt. 

“Oh, are you Mr. Goldsmith-Smith?” she chir- 
ruped. * 

Sam jumped. How bird-like the voice was, nor 
could he have been startled more if it had been a 
meadowlark. And what innocent blue eyes she had. 

“Ah, I beg your pardon, miss,” he apologised, “I 
didn’t hear you enter. Won’t you sit down? There 
at that desk, if you please. Yes, Mr. Goldsmith- 
Smith is in. I’ll call him.” Her back was towards 
him as she sat down; he stood up and beckoned his 
employer. 

“Come, she wants to see you,” he waved. 

“The devil ! see her yourself,” came the protest. 

“But I can’t; she asked for you — and you’re here.” 

“Then I’ll go.” 

“Come back, I say ; I told her you’re here !” 

“But I can’t — it’s spoiling my style.” 

“Confound your style! — Yes, miss; he’s coming 
directly.” 

And Sam sat down and resumed his work. A 
critic must draw the line somewhere, and he wasn’t 
going to listen to that young thing talk about her 
book, flooding his sophisticated ears with the music 
of her unsophisticated dreams. No, not whilst Mr. 
Goldsmith-Smith had nothing to do but pace the 


GOD'S REBEL. 


76 

floor. And he wrote savagely: “My dear Miss 
Jones, — We regret to say that we find your story un- 
available.” 

“Oh, then you are Mr. Goldsmith-Smith,” said 
the “other one” as that gentleman finally reached 
his desk. “Oh, I am so surprised !” 

She looked even more than her words; disap- 
pointed, even. At any rate, she did not smile on him 
so sunnily as she had on Sam. 

“Very sorry, I’m sure;” that’s what the girl heard 
him say, and what Sam heard him say, but what he 
really said internally was: The little fool! — “But 
what can I do for you?” 

“Oh, Mr. Smith — Mr. Goldsmith-Smith ! I really 
didn’t mean that. I was only surprised to find you 
so — so young.” 

The devil ! she certainly had an original style ; a 
sansculotte, possibly, unconventional in the ex- 
treme. Or was she guying him? He glowered at 
her; then he glowered at Sam. The latter had his 
head down within an inch of his work. 

“I knew you did such a perfectly enormous busi- 
ness, you know, sir ” 

“Yes, oh yes,” that gentleman agreed, dubiously. 

“And so,” she continued, but growing fearful ; “I 
have brought you my new story ” 

“Pardon me, your new story? Then you have 
written before ?” Ah, she was really a genius, per- 
haps, he thought. 

She coloured, seemed confused for a moment. 
“N-no, not exactly; that is, nothing of any conse- 
quence, sir.” 

He scanned her closely for the first time. Ah, it 
was too bad ! How pretty she was when she blushed ! 
Her cheeks were so plump, and the every curve of 
her body so graceful, so fresh, so natural ; without 
padding or stays, he would swear. She was fresh 


GOING DOWN! 


77 


butter and eggs and ripe cherries; he would have 
bet any money that she would dare a leap from the 
highest rafter in the hay-loft and rise sweeter than 
Venus from the fragrant waves below. Now why 
did she want to go and write a book ! In all his ex- 
perience as an author and publisher he had heard 
of but one girl of that kind who had ever done it 
successfully. 

“You didn’t give me your name,” he said, some- 
what more courteously. 

“Nannette” — she stammered, and halted. 

Smith shied. No, that name was unknown, it 
would never do. He might as well tell her at once. 

“I’m sorry, Miss Nannette. But we have made it 
a rule to accept no more manuscripts from new 
writers, — from those without fame.” 

“Oh, but,” she urged quickly, “you never can tell, 
sir, you know. Now, I’m sure Mr. So-and-so, and 
So-and-so” — she mentioned a few of their writers — 
“are not famous!” 

He sighed. “No, Miss Nan ” 

“Nielsen; Nannette Nielsen,” she corrected. 

It was all the same — the name was unknown. “No, 
Miss Nielsen; these men were not famous, and we 
found it out to our cost. Their books didn’t sell.” 

She was silent. The great world seemed to be 
crushing all the life and glad spirits out of her. She 
had been to six publishing houses that morning — 
and they had all told her the same. She had pur- 
posely chosen the O. G. Goldsmith-Smith Co. for the 
last trial. 

But no ; she would not stand it. Was she to be 
judged by the failures of others, instead of on her 
merits, the fruits of her own personality ? It was too 
ridiculous ! 

“My book is so different, sir — I’m sure it is. Now, 
if I could only leave it ” 


78 


GOD'S REBEL . 


“Oh, yes; by all means/’ Smith clutched; “of 
course you may leave it with us, Miss Nielsen. What 
is the address? You live out of town, I presume.” 

Her eyes snapped. “No, indeed! Why, how 
could you think so, sir?” 

His eyes fell precipitately beneath hers as he 
grasped his pencil. “Oh, I didn’t think so, Miss 
Nielsen — I merely asked it. You know, most of 
our authors do. Chicago isn’t a literary center. But 
it will be all right. We’ll return it properly. What 
is the address?” 

She hesitated. Could he really do such a mean 
thing as she feared? “No, I don’t want you to re- 
turn it,” she persisted stubbornly. “I’ll call. What 
would be the best time to come, sir?” 

“Well,” said he slowly; “you see our readers are 
very busy; there’s all that pile over there,” waving 
his hand towards the unavailable; “but suppose we 
say a month or six weeks.” 

“A month?” she cried helplessly. “O goodness 
me ! I can’t possibly wait that long. Why, I must 
make my living — and by writing. Oh, say a week, 
Mr. Smith — Mr. Goldsmith-Smith ; say a week ! I’ve 
been to nearly every publishing house in town ;” her 
eyelids trembled, the corners of her mouth drooped 
dangerously. 

He compromised quickly. A week, a day — an 
hour if she said so! 

“Oh, no, sir; you are so kind; but a week will 
do.” She was all rainbows now. What a chameleon 
creature it was — and it, it must make a living ! 

“Good-by,” she sang out; “I thank you so much, 
Mr. Goldsmith-Smith ; and you too,” including Sam 
in her sunbeam. And again at the door : “I know 
you will enjoy it; or anyway I hope you will — ■ 
almost as much as I did in writing it. Good-by.” 

Smith collapsed. “Sam, you old idiot ! why didn’t 


NANNETTE. 


79 

you stop her ? Why did you let her run on like that. 
Now what shall I do?” 

Sam scribbled dispassionately. “Do ? Why, read 
her story.” 

“The devil ! how can I ? Haven’t I got my own 
story to work on — and doesn’t the Sun have to come 
out next week? Now I tell you what I’m going 
to do,” and he jumped up and grabbed his hat and 
overcoat. “I’m going home — I shan’t be down 
again for a week ! Damn this business — and don’t 
you accept any stories from strange authors! Do 
you hear?” And Smith passed out, slamming the 
door behind him, and shouting at the passing ele- 
vator : “Going down ! damn it, going down !” 

Sam wrote on. He was in the midst of a review ; 
but noting that it was becoming an excoriation, he 
stopped. Confound him, he thought; why does a 
man want to act that way? Has he got to be a 
child all his life ? And that little young thing who 
left her book here in good faith thinking it would 
be read ! Humph, I haven’t time to look at it. Well, 
I’ll hand it to Mrs. Phillips. At least we’ll give it a 
reading, and Smith may do what he pleases. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

IV ANNETTE. 

“Kenneth, I’m sure we can’t go on this way 
much longer. Your income is so small. Have the 
publishers accepted your manuscript?” 

It was the old complaint; they were sitting at 
breakfast, the problems of the day frowning be- 
fore them. “No, not yet,” he admitted. “I must 


80 GOD’S REBEL . 

call and see them. However ” he hesitated, 

doubtfully. 

“Well, dear?” 

“I was only going to ask, Mabel, what you would 
think about selling this place and buying a less ex- 
pensive home? That would be one way out.” 

Mabel said nothing. Poor girl ! having been in- 
ured to comfort, provided for luxuriously all her 
life, she was now beginning to understand that the 
Nile, in the shape of some generous and improvi- 
dent physician and guardian, would never again 
overflow its banks to freshen the flowers along her 
pathway, and that King- Midas’ touch was not 
exactly identical with that of the college profes- 
sor’s — save perhaps with Dr. Little’s. 

“Dr. Little receives ten thousand a year,” she 
said musingly; “you know we could be quite com- 
fortable on half that. And I’m sure you work just 
as hard as he does.” 

He smiled. “Unfortunately, that isn’t the point, 
you know.” 

“But it seems too bad to have to sell your old 
home,” she continued. “Of course if we had been 
reckless, or extravagant, or done anything to de- 
serve it. Can’t I do something, Kenneth ?” suddenly, 
grasping at anything. “How would it do to take a 
boarder? A lady called here yesterday and wanted 
me to take her. She would pay six dollars a week.” 

He glanced up. “Would she ?” he asked curiously. 
“Humph ! we might try it for awhile, at least. What 
does she do — the boarder?” 

“She is an authoress, she said.” 

“Dear me! an authoress — at six dollars a week! 
Was she so very homely?” 

To think that his family should be reduced to such 
straits ! 

Mabel laughed. “Oh, no, not at all,” she de- 


N ANNETTE. 


81 


dared. ‘Indeed you would be quite surprised. 
She’s only a young girl, green, and no style, yet aw- 
fully pretty. She’s from the country and has come 
here to have her book published.” 

It was certainly tempting, even urgent. Enough 
to arouse the interest of a man who was not pre- 
tending to pose as a social reformer. 

“Why, in that case, Mabel, you better take her; 
that is, if you are sure she won’t cause you too 
much trouble. But is her manuscript accepted ?” 

Mabel shook her head. “She doesn’t know yet. 
She is coming back to-morrow morning. I told her 
I’d consider it. She is particularly desirous of com- 
ing here because we live so close in town.” 

Two days later, accordingly, the boarder arrived, 
with a diminutive trunk and a small leather violin- 
case on which was printed in irregular white letters : 
“Nannette Nielsen.” The latter Kenneth was es- 
pecially pleased to see ; it was eloquent of delightful 
winter evenings with charming trios. For he knew 
she could play; merely to look at her was proof 
enough of that, though she told scarcely anything 
of herself, her training, till she had been with them 
some time. And that she had accomplished so much 
— this was the wonder of it when they knew her 
story. 

When she was six years old — which was fourteen 
years ago — her parents had left France for America ; 
thence to the West, and final settlement on a little 
farm in Iowa. Here they had prospered fairly. 
But the unceasing toil, with winters of Greenland 
and summers that simmered, had worn her mother 
out, and her father had afterwards married a woman 
of native stock. Under this spur Nannette had at- 
tended the village schools ; had cooked and carried 
and fetched by day for the step-mother’s annual 
brood, and studied and written and dreamed by 


82 


GOD’S REBEL . 


night. As for her music, all the instruction she ever 
received had been at the hands of her mother ; her 
violin was only a plaything; she never thought it 
would bring her money. Meanwhile the time ar- 
rived for her to declare her total unbelief in the 
gods that prevailed. She had written and published 
one little story under a pseudonym, and it had been 
a failure, or so her publishers declared. She had 
another one ready now; it had gone to ten pub- 
lishers and been returned with the most polite let- 
ters she had ever read. Some, indeed, seemed al- 
most too polite to be honest; they could never re- 
fuse a manuscript after speaking so highly of it as 
all that! However, she would just go to the city 
and see. 

Whereupon arose strenuous objections. “Don’t 
you give her a penny, Peer — not a penny ! Do you 
hear?” screamed the mother of unborn generations. 

But Pierre had felt otherwise. She was his little 
Nannette — and he thought of her mother! No, this 
farm was no place for the child; but some two or 
three years before he had been in Des Moines to 
buy a threshing-machine, and in the office of the 
firm he had been amazed at the sight of so many 
pretty and well-dressed girls operating typewriters. 
Now, he asked, why couldn’t Nannette do that? He 
had no faith in her stories or violin ; but when she 
asked for permission to leave home, and for a little 
— a very little money, he had told her to wait for 
three months. Then he sent for one of those type- 
writers and informed her that she must master it; 
the world would be found willing to pay, probably, 
for that kind of music. Accordingly, at the end 
of three months she was an accomplished performer, 
playing it with her eyes shut and in all sorts of 
rhythm and time, with a merry little tink-a-link here 
and there so that one could almost see the birds 
fluttering about her manuscript as she wrote. 


NANNETTE . 


83 


“Lander love, Peer ! it’s ez good a’mos’ ez a plan- 
ner/’ the step-mother had observed, wallowing help- 
lessly in the plenitude of a sensation. So that this 
good woman could only gasp and stare with blank 
amaze when that wonderful machine was finally 
packed off to the city with Nannette, and with one 
hundred dollars of “Peer’s” money sewed in the 
lining of that young woman’s gown. 

“Where did you say you left your manuscript, 
Nannette?” asked Mabel, as they sat in the library. 

Nannette named the firm — the O. G. Goldsmith- 
Smith Publishing Co. “But they didn’t want it,” 
she declared frankly: “I know they didn’t. Oh 
dear! do you think they will take it, professor?” 

The professor didn’t know; he was puzzled. It 
was in general such a hopeless thing to expect, es- 
pecially when he knew that only nine per cent of all 
manuscripts offered were ever accepted. Still, Nan- 
nette was original; this might make a difference. 

“I wish I could have read it,” he said. “But you 
can be sure of one thing, it will come under the 
notice of one of the most competent readers in this 
city. I mean Mr. Kent.” 

“Oh, was he that man with dark eyes and dark 
hair? — you know I spoke to him, too,” and she 
laughed. Obviously Sam had impressed her. 

“Yes; his opinion will be worth having. But 
you didn’t tell me the name of your story?” 

Her eyes fell. “You might not like it. The name 
might prejudice you.” 

“I hate to have you think me prejudiced,” he in- 
sisted, “even in general.” 

She looked him over. “No, really, I don’t think 
so — I think you are wonderfully free. Only you 
may be quite intolerant, you know, and not know 
it.” 


84 


GOD’S REBEL . 


“You might try me, at any rate,” he answered, 
with amusement. 

“Well, it’s called, it’s called — The Desert Isle.” 

He gave a start. Yes, it certainly did arouse prej- 
udice; hitherto undiscoverable. Good heavens! 
couldn’t she have found a better name? Had her 
bubbling young life really been like that? 

“There now, you don’t like it! Does he, Mrs. 
Moore? And you don’t either. Oh dear! what 
shall I do?” 

Her helplessness was adorable. Mabel wondered 
why she hadn’t chosen the stage. It mightn’t be too 
late yet if her book didn’t succeed, she thought. 

Kenneth laughed. “Why Nannette — I — I con- 
fess that it startled me a little. Still, I don’t know 
that a desert isle would be so bad — anyway, not if 
you were there. And, besides, you know that’s all 
that literature is, merely the reflection of the writ- 
er’s personality. Otherwise it would have per- 
ished and ceased to be fresh centuries ago.” 

Nannette clasped her hands, her face brightened. 
“Ah, that is so good of you, professor. You know, 
I’ve often thought it was that way, too. I’ve tried 
to write only like myself.” 

“Yes, that’s true,” the professoi repeated dog- 
matically ; “it’s a scientific fact. Force and the or- 
ganism are constantly changing, hence the expres- 
sion is always fresh. That’s the explanation. So 
now, if it is just like yourself it is sure to be at- 
tractive and we shall all love it. And if you will 
be so kind as to take your feet off of Six Centuries of 
Work and Wages, I shall go on with my work. Oh, 
no, you won’t disturb me ; you and Mabel may talk 
as much as you please.” 

An hour later, as he was drawing on his coat in 
the hall, Mabel entered. “Are you going out?” she 
asked. 


N ANNETTE. 85 

“Only across the street ; I shall be back presently,” 
he replied hastily. 

She frowned. “I do wish, Kenneth, that if you 
are going over to Mr. Ludington’s you would avoid 
saying anything to offend him.” 

He paused, in surprise. “To offend him? But 
why should I offend him?” 

“Pshaw ! you know what I mean, Kenneth, only 
you are so regardless. You forget his wealth, and 
that all your theories are necessarily offensive to 
him. Moveover, I know from something he said 
to me that he was deeply disappointed because you 
disapproved of his gift to the astronomical depart- 
ment. Now don’t make him think you have become a 
crank !” 

The professor grinned. “There are only two 
kinds of people in this world, my dear: fools and 
cranks. Good-by, I’ll promise not to offend him un- 
duly, even should he insist on buying a telescope.” 

But she caught him on the threshold. “Wait! 
one thing more,” she cried. “You haven’t forgotten 
about Tuesday evening, have you?” 

He reflected quickly. “Tuesday evening? No, 
that’s the date of my lecture at Wheeling.” 

“No, it isn’t; that’s the evening of Mrs. Adams’ 
reception. Really, Kenneth, it would be shameful 
to miss that ! Besides, I do wish you would give up 
your work among those labouring men. Champion 
that class all you wish in college, in public speak- 
ing, but for goodness sake don’t let yourself come 
in contact with them — don’t touch them; never let 
them call you one of themselves or take actual part 
in their disputes. If you do they will crucify you, 
some day. You will see, they can’t help it ; they are 
so hopelessly ignorant. Now do be sensible, Ken- 
neth ! Keep with your own class.” 

Again he paused, this time with some annoyance. 


86 


GOD'S REBEL . 


Ignoring her objections, he answered: “Indeed, 
Mabel, I don’t know whom I can ask to take my 
place. I should have to turn the lecture over to 
Professor Lawrence, and you know we are not of 
the same faith.” But seeing her disappointment, 
he added, quickly: “However, I’ll try to arrange 
matters, somehow,” and passed out. 

Since their visit to Mr. Exstein’s sweat-shop 
Kenneth had seen but little of Mr. Ludington, but 
that the revelation and the manner of it had been 
somewhat of a shock to the old gentleman he could 
readily understand ; perhaps the sight and the argu- 
ment had even been “offensive,” as Mabel had just 
suggested. Still he hoped for some good to come 
out of it, sometime; for a day to come when the 
old gentleman would no longer have the heart to 
sit comfortably in his study philosophising over life 
whilst the many toiled and starved, or beguiling 
himself with the senile vagaries of Herbert Spencer 
to the effect that “the necessities which Nature im- 
poses upon us are not to be evaded, even by the 
joint efforts of university graduates and working- 
men delegates ; and the endeavour to escape her harsh 
discipline results in a discipline still harsher.” No ; 
he would convince Mr. Ludington that these fright- 
ful necessities, such, for instance, as sweat-shops, 
were not imposed upon human beings by Nature, 
but by the curse of private capital seeking to increase 
its profits : the only cure for which, he had frankly 
insisted, was to get rid of the whole miserable 
profit-system of doing business. 

“Well, professor,” said the old gentleman softly, 
as he replied to his greeting, “I will admit that I’ve 
been thinking of your proposition lately. However, 
I’m far from satisfied as to the practicability of 
municipal farms and workshops. It’s too revolu- 
tionary.” 


NANNETTE. 


8 7 

Whereupon, accepting his challenge, for a full 
half hour the younger man proceeded to give in 
rapid detail somewhat of his accumulated knowledge 
of the subject; from Blackstone to Henry George, 
from the socialism of Christ to that of John Stuart 
Mill, there was not an inch of the way that he had 
not thoroughly travelled and made his own. The 
land, he maintained, was the common heritage of 
the people ; for one man or set of men to allege own- 
ership to any fraction thereof was to deny the bal- 
ance of mankind the merest right to live. Of the 
naked truth of this proposition honest men of all 
ages and all countries had long been practically 
agreed. It was only where the suppression of truth 
was needed now and again in order to bolster up a 
tottering plutocracy that denials had been made. As 
Macaulay had once said, “The force of gravity 
would unquestionably be denied if financial interests 
were harmed by its acceptance.” And so, in this 
manner, he went on to speak of the suffering and 
slavery entailed upon a people by the private owner- 
ship of land in India, Ireland, wherever Mammon 
had ravaged to suit its pleasure, and finally in this — 
the country which we called our own ! 

“But is this what you and your fellow professors 
are teaching to-day, Kenneth, in the university?” 
asked the old gentleman, astounded. 

“Some of us, sir ; but the pity of it is that there 
are a few professors left who, with reasons more or 
less dark and obscure, still continue substantially to 
teach that the earth is flat.” 

Mr. Ludington laughed. “You mean figuratively, 
of course?” 

“No', not necessarily; just listen to this; it is 
from Professor Lawrence’s text-book on economics. 
I quote from memory: 

“ Tn the economic sense, Rent is the payment 


GOD'S REBEL. 


83 


which an owner receives for the use of natural 
agents, such as land, whether arable or timber land, 
mineral deposits, water-power, or land peculiarly 
situated for building purposes. Rent is a payment, 
not for the use of another’s capital, but for the use of 
natural agents belonging to another. Rent is pos- 
sible because natural agents are not unlimited in 
quantity as air or sunshine is.’ ” 

“Humph! that’s strange!” sighed the old gentle- 
man uneasily. “A mistake or a falsehood at the 
very start and, as Kenneth smiled he con- 
tinued : “The professor ought to know, my son, 
that air and sunshine are just as much limited in 
quantity as the land is. They are limited, substan- 
tially, by and to the face of this earth. Of course 
there may be air and sunshine in Mars, but if so they 
do not concern us. The only reason that I can think 
of, Kenneth, why air and sunshine have not been 
monopolised in the same manner as other natural 
agents belonging to another ” — and the old gentle- 
man winked slyly at the professor’s smug paradox — 
“is not because they are unlimited, but because the 
effects of their being monopolised would have been 
too sudden for the people to submit calmly. Yes, 
it is only when some old monopoly, such as land 
and vested rights, comes creeping insidiously but 
relentlessly down the ages, that men submit calmly 
and without a murmur for many a weary year. Such 
a proposition as this you have just quoted reminds 
me forcibly of the words of a dear old classmate : 
‘Sin has many tools, but a lie is the handle which 
fits them all.’ ” 

And perceiving his advantage, Kenneth urged: 
“Ah, then you admit, Mr. Ludington, that there are 
giant wrongs and inequalities imposed upon the 
people, not by Nature, but by man’s inordinate 
greed and selfishness — the desire of the few to per- 


N. ANNETTE . 


89 


petuate slavery upon the many. Well, I appeal to 
your generosity, to your Democracy — is it fair? 
Here we are, a Republic, yet all our so-called free 
institutions and industries are founded upon the old 
fraudulent basis of worn-out monarchies and aris- 
tocracies. Do you think it can continue? Do you 
believe that any Republic or Democracy can stand 
long on such terms — where the few are engaged 
in the legalised robbery of the many?” 

He spoke ardently, in low tones; and his words 
stirred the old man from his wonted languor as he 
cleared his voice, hesitated a moment, then attempt- 
ed to reply. 

“No; I don’t deny that there are wrongs, Ken- 
neth; evils, too, that must grow worse as concen- 
tration of capital and new machinery continue to 
throw more and more men out of employment. 
Every millionaire freshly created means a thousand 
more paupers for society to support. Still, it is the 
remedy that I distrust more than the disease. I 
doubt whether your municipal farms and work- 
shops would be best.” 

Meanwhile he would consider it; there was 
never any hurry about such matters. “If the world 
needs workshops more than telescopes,” said he, “let 
the people manifest their desires.” 

“Ah, but you forget, Mr. Ludington,” Kenneth 
sighed, leaning back in his chair wearily, “you 
forget that the people can no longer manifest their 
desires; that the men whom they elect to represent 
them have ceased to represent anything save the 
power of private capital and corruption.” 


90 


GOD’S REBEL. 


CHAPTER IX. 

TANGENTS AND TYROS. 

Meantime, by one of those strange mischances 
that now and then discovers an author to the world 
in spite of the thousand and one barriers, Nan- 
nette’s manuscript had actually been read. It had 
come under Mr. Kent’s eye, which is to say that the 
camel had passed through the needle’s eye. And her 
story had been accepted. 

On the day after her visit Sam had taken the 
manuscript out of purgatory and laid it on his desk 
preparatory to carrying it to Mrs. Phillips, who fre- 
quently read manuscripts for him. She had a fond- 
ness for a new story, and her judgment, he believed, 
was equal to any one’s. “A woman’s opinion, Oli- 
ver,” he used to say, “may be safely trusted on a 
thing so unknowable as a story designed to please 
the public.” A dictum that aroused no argument, in- 
asmuch as he, as well as Sam, had been forced to 
admit his total incompetency time and again in esti- 
mating the wants of the fickle public that reads. 

Accordingly, Sam boarded the train one evening, 
manuscript in his pocket ; but when half way to Mrs. 
Phillips’ a strange disinclination came over him ; not 
wholly unknown to him, but of that species that 
seizes a man now and then, at unexpected moments, 
and causes him to halt and turn back, though he 
were bound for the very temple of delight. Some 
stalking vision of that sub-conscious self, perhaps, 
that shadows one, whispering the eternal folly of 
flight, of other company, when one can never cease 
but be alone. At any rate he went no farther, but 
got off at the first station and caught the next train 


TANGENTS AND TYROS. 


9 l 

back to the city. Entering a neighbouring hotel, 
he glanced over the theatre announcements — melo- 
drama, soubrettes, women in tights, but naught that 
interested him. Thence to the street again, and an 
aimless walk of two blocks, when he found himself 
in front of the business house where he had worked 
for ovei* twenty years. Some passing memory of 
his former self caused him to pause there a mo- 
ment, then he strolled on again heedlessly as before. 
The voice of his old manager was still calling after 
him : “Sam, you are to return here at any time that 
you see fit.” And the faintest echo of that same 
voice many years earlier : “Humph ! well, you bet- 
ter stay on the floor. That’s the place for you, Sam ; 
accustom yourself to the stock so you can find any 
book in the dark.” He smiled softly. He might 
show the old house a trick or two yet if Oliver would 
only get over that nonsense about unknown authors. 
Dead men were not going to write the literature of 
the future. Times were changing. The unknown 
were feeling the forces of these changes, perhaps, 
more than those famous authors who were resting 
on their oars. It was largely for this reason that he 
had quit the old house ; they were too set, too con- 
servative — but now if Smith was going to make 
an ass of himself merely because they had sustained 
a few losses 

He paused. Where was he ? Why, at Mrs. Brady’s. 
His mood and his feet had taken him there, with 
twenty years’ habit behind to push him. It was 
merely an instinct to feel for his latch-key and let 
himself in, and cry out to the face that beamed upon 
him as she held the lamp and he ascended the stairs 
to his room : “Good evening, Mrs. Brady. Are you 
well to-night?” and to hear the usual answer: 
“Pretty, Mr. Sam. Lord bless you !” 

But when Sam had reached his room and lit his 


92 


GOD'S REBEL . 


student lamp, his eyes roamed over the book-shelves 
and he found nothing to satisfy him. That stuff, 
too, was all dead ; it didn’t matter whether it were 
written two thousand years ago or two months ago. 
That particular combination of forces that called 
it forth, that gave it birth, was no more. His mind 
was in a thoroughly receptive state. He was out of 
the city ; he was a transcendentalism and he wanted 
something outre. So that for a quarter of an hour 
he continued to pace the floor, pausing anon before 
his book-shelves, drawing out a volume and finger- 
ing its pages, but only to end with a “Humph! I 
can’t read that stuff to-night,” and placing it back 
again. In very despair he stood at last before his 
desk, and in sheer thoughtlessness picked up his 
scissors and cut the cord that bound the manuscript 
he had deposited there. He was a mere automaton 
in the act, having undone packages of that nature in 
just that way so often as to be unconscious of the 
process. 

The Desert Isle — he smiled. How enchanting 
the title at this particular moment ! Surely, that was 
outre to the last degree. At any other time, per- 
haps, so arbitrary was the critic’s mood in repress- 
ing the struggling but insistent genius of the age, 
that name would have damned it utterly and the 
manuscript would have flown to the — to the unavail- 
able, in short order. 

But now it was refreshing. Sam actually chuckled 
and smacked his lips as he settled back in his chair. 
That name was a complete surprise, an appetising 
cocktail to the feast he contemplated. 

“Ah, it starts in well,” he thought. “How replete 
is that first paragraph ! At least it implies that the 
writer is no novice. She speaks in figures, not in 
a continuous and endless chain of dawdling, wan- 
dering words; and each figure, perfectly chosen, 


TANGENTS AND TYROS. 


93 


suggests whole pages, volumes, dynasties, Aye, she 
knows the algebra of her art ! And what a free and 
joyous style !” 

By midnight the desert isle was wholly delightful. 
He had lost the power to analyze, and gave himself 
up to its enjoyment body and soul. Merely the story 
of Calyce and Evathlus over again — or of Sappho ; 
but lambent of the author’s personality. Yet some- 
what there was that reminded him of another story 
which he had admired, and that had been a failure — 
The Rhapsodist. But again, not so very many years 
ago, one of this kind had come to us from Africa, 
and it — it had been a success ! Why not again ? Why 
not again — for thev were as different as the sandy 
veld and grassy prairie? 

And so, let come what might, the story was a 
success with him. He was both thrilled and satis- 
fied; upon its conclusion, some time past two 
o’clock, he simply laid the manuscript in his lap, 
his head resting on the back of his chair, and 
dreamed the balance of the night of that marvelous 
desert isle that he had just discovered, and that 
ere morning was fairly colonised with sweet 
Calyces. 

“Mr. Sam — oh, Mr. Sam ! Ain’t you coming to 
breakfast?” 

Sam shook himself together, made his toilet, and 
by nine o’clock was traveling that same road 
he had gone over the night before towards Mrs. 
Phillips’. But this time he was positive — he wanted 
to see her. And he clutched the manuscript in his 
hand as though it were a bag of gold. 

He rang the bell and waited in the hall. 

“Oh, it is Mr. Kent. Won’t you come in and 
sit down? You surprised me — I thought it was 
the doctor. You know Potiphar was quite ill last 
night — had the most horrible dreams. Now, what 


94 


GOD’S REBEL . 


would you do for him, if you were I ?” She seemed 
distressed withal. 

Sam meditated. His knowledge of medicine was 
limited. He had never heard of but one person in 
all his life who had ever tried taking anything for 
‘'horrible dreams,” and then not with the happiest 
of results, perhaps. Still, it might be different with 
Potiphar. 

“King Midas,” he observed slowly, “drank bull’s 
hot blood. You might urge it, Mrs. Phillips; at 
least he is your own husband and you may do what- 
ever you please with him.” 

She gasped. “What do you mean?” Then the 
recollection of the tale came over her and she 
laughed despite herself, whilst he regarded her nar- 
rowly. 

“That’s real mean in you, Mr. Kent. Nay, it’s 
brutal — if you knew how ill he was. What have 
you got in your hand ?” 

Sam looked to see. “Oh, I forgot — I want you 
to read it. No, I can’t stop. Read it! Read it 
and bring it in when you come downtown. Good- 
by; Pm late this morning and in a hurry.” 

However, he arrived at the office in good season 
and without anyone being aware of the delay ; for 
Oliver Goldsmith, in conformity with his last dis- 
gruntled threat, had not been seen at his desk for 
several days. He had stuck to his text religiously ; 
staying at home, drinking nothing stronger than 
claret and tea, and keeping at work with an in- 
dustry truly heroic on that love-story which he was 
bound should be merely light and frothy and on 
no account go below the surface. But on the fifth 
day his fears overwhelmed him — they hampered his 
style. What if that old idiot, Sam, were to accept 
a story by a strange author? Why, it would ruin 
him! It would sweep away in a second all that 


TANGENTS ANT TYROS. 


95 


money that his uncle had left him. He would have 
nothing left but the name — no, he was damned if 
he’d have that, either ! But the money? His stories 
hadn’t sold very well lately — he feared he was losing 
his grip. Still, it couldn’t be that; it was simply 
the annoyance and burden of this publishing busi- 
ness that was spoiling him. But then, it would never 
do to give up now. He must fight to keep his money 
to the last breath. 

Wherefore he hurried into hat and coat and was 
off downtown like a shot: he must keep a watch 
on Sam. 

“Hello, old man. Nothing up, I suppose?” 

Sam glanced up. “Oh, is that you, Oliver? No; 
everything’s lovely.” 

Goldsmith gladdened. 

“Ah, I’m devilish glad to hear that , Sam. But I 
say, now; I don’t suppose you’ve heard anything 
yet from any of those celebrated authors, have you?” 

Sam shuddered. Had Oliver been drinking? 
“You forget, Oliver, it’s been less than a week since 
we sent off those letters.” 

“The devil! is it possible? It seems a month. 
Do you know, I believe I’ve been working too hard 
lately. I think I’ll quit writing for awhile and go 
out more. What do you think ?” 

“Why, I don’t think ; nobody needs to think about 
that. Of course you ought to: it’s what every 
author ought to do.” 

It was the second time Sam had been called on 
for medical advice that morning, and he had given 
it generously, in full accord with the truth that was 
in him. 

“Well, I believe I’ll begin, then, this very day,” 
Oliver decided. “I’ll swear off. I sha’n’t open my 
desk, you know, but just loaf around town. If any- 
thing comes up all you need to do is to wait for me. 


GOD’S REBEL. 


96 

I’ll drop in every hour or so and talk it over with 
you.” He opened the door. “Down, there ! Going 
down ! I’ll be back in a little while, old man.” And 
he was off. 

In this way he could best keep an eye on Sam, 
and Sam would never know it ! After awhile they’d 
hear from some author with a name. Then every- 
thing would be all right. 

And so it went on for that day, and for the sixth, 
and on the seventh Oliver had so far forgotten him- 
self and regained his equanimity as to sit in his 
chair and put his feet on the desk. It was a busi- 
ness-like attitude; he liked it; and he could watch 
Sam work — and Sam could work better than any 
man he ever saw. 

But in the very midst of these pleasant and opti- 
mistic reflections the door opened and some one came 
in with a package of manuscript in her hand. 
“What! another one?” Oliver took his feet down 
in a hurry and glared savagely. But no ; it was only 
Mrs. Phillips. She bowed to him sweetly and smiled. 

“Oh, Mr. Kent,” she cried, hurrying straight to 
Sam’s desk, “I cannot tell you the pleasure you have 
given me. It is the dearest little story I’ve read in 
many a day. It’s absolutely unique ; a perfect gem 
of its kind !” 

“Wh- what’s that? Who is it by?” gasped 
Smith in consternation. 

“A new author, Oliver,” Sam answered quietiy; 
and to her: “I’m pleased to bear witness to your 
good taste, Mrs. Phillips. But I knew you’d enjoy 
it.” 

“Oh, yes, immensely. But can you get it out 
before the holidays, Mr. Goldsmith-Smith ?” 

“Oh, no, quite impossible,” replied that gentleman 
hastily. “But who is it by? Why don’t one of you 


TANGENTS AND TYROS. 97 

say who it’s by ?” And he came over to have a look 
at it. 

“A Miss Nannette Nielsen is the author, Oliver.” 

Smith staggered. “What ! that country girl ? Oh, 
no, you don’t mean it. Still, I presume you did 
enjoy it, Mrs. Phillips. It must have been very 
amusing. Yes, I can easily understand that,” and 
he laughed, glancing from one to the other. But 
what in the devil did they mean by looking so seri- 
ous over it ? There wasn’t going to be any funeral 
— no, sir, not on him ! 

“Oliver,” said Sam solemnly, “you may take my 
word for it that this manuscript,” and he thumped 
it three times with his fist, “is the work of a genius. 
It’s the rarest thing of the year, and for many a 
year.” 

Oliver thrust his hands in his pockets, walked 
over to the window, and back again. Now, what 
did Sam meamby taking advantage of him like this 
before Mrs. Phillips? How could he express him- 
self adequately whilst she stood there looking at him 
like that ? It wasn’t right ; it was all a conspiracy. 
Anyway, he wasn’t going to stand it. 

“Really, Mrs. Phillips, I beg your pardon, you 
know; I don’t question your judgment, nor Sam’s. 
But we made it an invariable rule just the other day 
that we should accept no more stories from strange — 
from unknown authors. Isn’t that so, Sam?” 

“Ah, but that is so foolish, Mr. Goldsmith-Smith,” 
she promptly repudiated. “Of course I don’t want 
to interfere with your business, but you know litera- 
ture doesn’t go by rules. Does it, Mr. Kent?” 

Smith parried, and lunged. “Not literature, per- 
haps, Mrs. Phillips. Yes, I grant you that. But it’s 
business, I say — hard work ; the investment of cap- 
ital and the avoidance of risks. This certainly has 
to go by rules. Why, Sam knows that.” 


9 8 


GOD’S REBEL . 


“But there isn’t any risk,” she retorted. “I’ve 
read it, and Mr. Kent has read it. All you have to 
do is to publish it. There’s no risk; is there, Mr. 
Kent?” 

Good Lord! was she serious? Did she want to 
ruin him? She was pushing him to the wall, and 
Sam stood there and said nothing ! 

“Is the author a — a friend of yours, Mrs. Phil- 
lips?” he queried cautiously. 

“Oh, no ; not at all. I know nothing of her. Only 
I do think it would be doing her a great wrong and 
injustice to refuse her manuscript. Besides, I be- 
lieve you would be the one to regret it in the end — 
for, of course, there are other publishers.” 

“Why, of course there are, Mrs. Phillips,” smiling 
at his chance. “I’ll just tell you what I’ll do, now,” 
sitting at his desk and grasping his pen. “I’ll give 
you a letter to some of them — to McBugle & Dunn, 
Sam’s old firm, you know, telling them what a splen- 
did story it is, and you can take it over to them.” 

“Who — I? But what have I to do with it, Mr. 
Goldsmith-Smith?” she laughed. 

“Why, you’re interested in it, aren’t you? and 
you have influence and ” 

“Nonsense, Oliver,” Sam interposed. “Do you 
think McBugle & Dunn would look at a manuscript 
we had refused?” 

“Yes ; why not ? — of course I do. You know very 
well they are not as capable of judging a story as — 
as we are, Sam. They would be glad of our opin- 
ion.” 

Sam was getting warm ; began to walk the floor. 
“Perhaps, Oliver, if you had worked there as long 
as I had and seen the stuff come in, pile up, and 
be returned without ever being opened save to 
enclose an unavailable slip, you wouldn’t be so con- 
fident. No, their reputation is made; their stand- 


TANGENTS AND TYROS. 


99 

ing is assured. But for us — I tell you this is the 
chance of a lifetime. This manuscript must not be 
rejected !” 

Smith was fairly stunned. Sam had never spoken 
to him like that before. He wished he could fire 
him on the spot. But he couldn’t ; if he did he would 
have to get another fireman for the Sun — and he 
didn’t know where to find one, unfortunately. 

‘‘But now I’ll tell you what we’ll do, Oliver,” 
coaxed the insubordinate, “we’ll just get out a small 
edition — say two thousand — of this manuscript, this 
Desert Isle, and if there’s any loss you may charge it 
up to my salary. How does that strike you ?” 

Manifestly, it disconcerted him. He tried to 
smile, but succeeded only indifferently, felt that he 
had made a fool of himself. All his better nature 
came back to him — as better nature is fain to do 
whenever money is not involved. “Why, Sam, I — 
really, I beg your pardon a thousand times, you 
know. And I wouldn’t have you think for the 
world, Mrs. Phillips, that I doubt your judgment, 
for I think more of your opinion than — than ” 

“Than is good for you, perhaps.” 

“Well, perhaps; but that’s not your fault, you 
know. It’s the public’s. Anyway, you mustn’t 
think I meant anything personal. Oh, no; not in 
the least. It’s only this — this damnable publishing 
business ! It worries the life out of me. It’s not my 
element. But go ahead and publish it, Sam — and 
it sha’n’t come out of your salary, either !” 

An hour later, when quiet had been restored and 
the head of the O. G. Goldsmith-Smith Publishing 
Co. sat at his desk with his head down, poring over 
that mascot manuscript even as Sam had done a few 
nights ago, the door again opened, cautiously, silent- 
ly, and a little figure flew in, all fragrant and frosty 
and sparkling, but oh ! so dreadfully anxious. She 


100 


GOD’S REBEL . 


went right past Sam’s desk, and was seated in that 
chair where the culprit is accustomed to sit whilst 
awaiting the verdict, almost before Oliver was aware 
of her presence. 

“Good afternoon, Mr. Goldsmith-Smith. I — 

I’ve come to see if you have decided.” 

Goldsmith glanced at her; being still far away 
in the story, he appeared to look right through her. 
It was not auspicious, and her heart thumped 
cruelly. 

“Ah, it’s Miss Nielsen,” he replied, and halted. 
“Well, my dear ” 

“Oh, yes, sir,” she consented swiftly. 

“My dear Miss Nielsen,” he continued mechan- 
ically, yet ominously. “You know that there are 
many, many risks involved in printing a story from 
a strange author. In fact, it’s all an experiment.” 

“Oh, dear! is it always, sir?” 

“Yes, always, Miss Nielsen ; always.” And again 
he paused. He could never forget that ; although he 
was still so lost in the tale that he could not bring 
himself to consider the author. 

Sam fidgeted in his chair. Why did he want to 
keep the poor young thing suffering like that ! 

“But after all, Miss Nielsen,” Oliver continued, 
still looking through her, “your story has greatly 
pleased me and I have decided to publish it.” 

She bounded in the air like a ball. “Oh, you dear 
old thing, you !” 

She had kissed him; her arms had been round 
his neck ; her music had filled the room and she was 
out of the door like a bird. 

Smith stood up, turned round, shook himself, and 
concluded he had read that in the story. 

Sam wrote on. The following week his elegant 
little essay in the Sun , entitled “Tangents and Ty- 
ros,” was greatly enjoyed. 


A RECEPTION. 


IOI 


CHAPTER X. 

A RECEPTION AND A REMINISCENCE. 

Despite his fears of Professor Lawrence’s first 
principles, Kenneth persuaded him to take his class 
for one evening and prepared to go with Mabel and 
Nannette to Mrs. Adams’ reception as prom- 
ised. He had always enjoyed society, but since 
returning from abroad they had persistently refused 
all invitations, and until now the respect due his 
father’s memory had sufficed to keep Mabel from 
murmuring at their enforced home-staying. But 
this winter, she had declared, was going to be gay ; 
it was a law of nature that when people are young 
they should enjoy themselves; this world being 
chiefly remarkable for the dexterity with which peo- 
ple try to conform to natural law in the midst of an 
unnatural environment. With the century’s im- 
proved facilities even Tantalus should be able to 
grasp something. 

“The carriage is waiting, Mabel,” her husband 
called, stepping from the hall as he adjusted his 
muffler and drew on his overcoat. “Are you girls 
nearly ready ?” 

“Yes, dear, in a minute,” she answered, with 
voice suggestive of several pins still remaining in 
the mouth and which must first be mysteriously dis- 
posed somewhere ere the proper feeling of feminine 
safety could ensue. 

He walked the floor slowly, into the library, 
turned over a book, repaced his way to the parlour, 
drummed a chord or two, whirled round on the 
piano-stool, looked out of the window, yet still that 
remarkable minute, which is adequately measured 


102 


GOD'S REBEL. 


only by a man’s experience of such, crept on apace. 

“Is it cold out, Kenneth?” Mabel asked in a voice 
a shade less pinful than before. She wished he 
wouldn’t be so impatient. 

“Awfully, darling; twenty below, at least,” he 
answered, shivering at the words and moving to- 
wards the radiator. 

“Won’t you please get my cape and hold it where 
it will get warm? I shall be ready in a minute.” 

“Certainly; I thought you had it.” He hastened 
into the hall and up the stairs, two at a jump. “By 
Jove!” he added, on returning, unfolding the furs 
before the radiator, “I should think that poor devil 
of a coachman would freeze up.” 

“Only a minute more, dear, and I shall be ready. 
Have you got your coat on?” 

“Yes, Mabel.” 

“Then won’t you see, please, if my fan is in your 
pocket. I haven’t seen it since that night we went 
to the theatre.” 

He dropped the cloak and felt hurriedly in both 
deep side-pockets. “Why, no,” he called, “it’s not 
here.” 

He heard Mabel say “Sh!” and Nannette gig- 
gled. 

“Oh dear, then it must surely be upstairs. Won’t 
you fetch it, please?” 

“Upstairs?” he cried confusedly, wondering how 
it was that a woman could be so indefinite in her 
data. 

“Well, I think it’s in the drawer of the dressing 
table in the east room. Do hurry, Kenneth; I am 
waiting.” 

And again he flew up the stairs, into the east 
room, west room, north room, and opening nearly 
every drawer that he came to, but to no avail. “It 
is strange,” he muttered, as he turned out the gas 


A RECEPTION. 


103 


from one room and prepared to cross the hall into 
another, “what in the deuce can have become of that 
fan !” And he lit the gas and again went through 
the drawers. Lord! but it was warm with that 
muffler and overcoat on. What was the use of his 
getting ready so soon, anyway? It was now past 
nine o’clock; he would have had time to attend to 
his class and reach home again before this. And 
he really felt a qualm as he thought of Professor 
Lawrence occupying his chair and telling his class 
that air and sunshine were unlimited in quantity, 
whilst the earth was limited. “A bureau drawer, it 
seems, is limited in size, but its capacity is unlim- 
ited.” He laughed, resolving to ask his friend Law- 
rence about this deduction on sight. Still he rum- 
maged, eagerly, hotly, enthusiasm unabated; a pro- 
jecting shelf catching the crown of his high hat as 
he leaned over and sending it rolling across the 
floor. “When we cease to adapt ourselves to our 
environment,” he was saying to himself. “Con- 
found that fan, anyway !” 

“Kenneth, Kenneth! are you never coming?” 
Mabel called from below. 

“Why, yes, Mabel,” he cried, picking up his hat, 
“but I can’t find that miserable fan.” 

“Dear me, Kenneth, didn’t you hear me say I’d 
found it ?” 

He came to the head of the stairs and looked down 
at her. 

“Mabel, did you have that fan all the while?” 

She laughed. “Nonsense! you know you are 
always so impatient, Kenneth. Come ! we are late.” 

Mrs. Adams’ reception that evening belonged to 
that species of entertainment which is politely known 
as a crush, the pressure being so bad that everyone 
looked hopelessly good natured, whilst giving rise 
to the impression that men and women, after all, 


104 


GOD’S REBEL. 


were highly socialised creatures and preferred stand- 
ing shoulder to shoulder rather than remaining 
apart. That one man’s hand was at every other 
man’s throat, or that one woman’s hand yearned to 
pull every other woman’s hair was a fact that, at 
this particular time, no sane person would have cared 
to express ; there being some ideas only fit for day- 
light and the counting-room, and which, howsoever 
true, one is not supposed to harbour and carry in 
one’s head at a reception. 

“Really, Professor Moore, I am so delighted,” 
murmured a sweet little woman at his side, Mrs. 
Adams, to whom Mabel had just presented him, 
“that you have favoured us this evening. I believe 
you go out so little ?” 

He thanked her, plead excuses of various forms, 
and, Mabel and Nannette being held in conversa- 
tion and utterly lost in a circling labyrinth fully 
three feet away, in reply to her threat to introduce 
him, he shouldered his way through the sea, the little 
woman following like a rudder in his wake, her hand 
on his sleeve. 

“Let me see, do you know Mrs. Anthony?” she 
asked, as they stood a moment in an oasis near a bay 
window. 

He shook his head hopelessly. “The nearest will 
do, Mrs. Adams.” 

She laughed. “No, she asked after you; we must 
find her. Ah, here she is now.” 

The person sought was sitting on a sofa, a gentle- 
man at her side, whom Kenneth faintly remembered 
having somewhere seen before. The latter rose as 
Kenneth stood bowing before them. “I shall leave 
you with Mrs. Anthony,” said his hostess, and van- 
ished. 

“Please sit beside me, Dr. Moore. The crowd 
and the standing tire me to death. Potiphar, won’t 


A RECEPTION. 


105 


you try and find Enid?” And now the memory of 
the name and the face came back with a start as the 
gentleman bowed and withdrew. 

“I see you don’t remember me, Dr. Moore.” 

“Oh, yes. I beg your pardon,” he protested reck- 
lessly. 

“What, you do — or do you seek to flatter an old 
woman’s vanity?” And she laughed in a manner 
that displayed the dimples and the ghost of a 
younger face. “Let me see, I haven’t seen you 
since — no, no! it would be challenging old age to 
call up all those years. But I believe the last time 
I remember seeing you and your father was just 
before we moved away from the city.” 

“Yes, I remember,” he answered thoughtfully, 
recognising her now. 

“Do you, indeed? Ha, ha, ha!” Leaning slight- 
ly towards him and tapping his shoulder lightly with 
her fan, she continued : “And do you remember 
how you and Enid came into the house dripping 
from head to foot like two drowned rats, both her 
stockings dangling over her shoes, and plastered 
with mud from her face down, from having fallen 
into a hole?” 

“Yes; I pulled her out,” he admitted, reminis- 
cently. “Did she never tell you?” 

“Thanks! You might have left her. It would 
have saved me a great deal of trouble at the time — 
and, perhaps, afterwards.” She sighed. “The girl 
leads her dear husband a perfectly awful chase — I 
may tell you this as an old friend. I feel so sorry for 
him sometimes, for I know what it is — I know what 
it is, I tell you. But what are you doing, Kenneth ? 
Practising?” 

“Not medicine,” he answered. “I am in the uni- 
versity.” 

“Ah! you are teaching music?” 


io6 


GOD'S REBEL . 


“No; political economy.” 

“Dear me ! Whoever would have thought you’d 
have taken up such an old dead thing as that ! You’re 
an unnatural son, neither your father nor your 
mother’s. But have you given up your music en- 
tirely ? I remember that you used to play wonder- 
fully.” 

He told her briefly of his work, his life, with, per- 
haps, a touch of the enthusiasm which he could never 
wholly obscure. “Tut! you will be training with 
those horrible anarchists next,” she admonished. 
“What do you think is going to become of our coun- 
try, anyway? Sometimes when I read the papers 
nowadays and catch a faint rumbling of all this 
smothered resentment and hatred, I declare, it fairly 
makes me feel that poor Hiram was a fool to spend 
all the energy of his life in getting money. You 
know he became interested in mines, Kenneth, when 
we moved out to Nevada. For twenty years we 
lived among those Indians and half-civilised 
wretches, save for an occasional trip east and across 
the ocean. But up to the very day of his death, over 
a year ago, he continued to be so wrapped up in 
getting money out of his mines that he lost all in- 
terest in everything else. Ah, how I used to long for 
the days when he was only a well-paid clerk and we 
were back in the city !” 

“Enid must have enjoyed the free life, though, I 
should think.” 

“Enid! Dear me, no!” she exclaimed. “We 
scarcely saw the child after she was five years old. 
You see there were no schools in that country to 
suit us, so that for fifteen years Enid was never home 
save on a visit. And that accounts for it — her pe- 
culiarities, her indifference to the opinion of every- 
body. Whilst as for Potiphar — ah, me, poor Poti- 
phar!” 


A RECEPTION. 


107 

Mrs. Anthony sighed, breathed herself, attempt- 
ing to drive the incubus from her with her fan. 

“Her husband, I believe?” Kenneth faltered, 
faintly conscious of some slight feeling of rem- 
onstrance while framing the sentence, but which he 
vaguely attributed to a certain animosity aroused 
by that gentleman’s personal appearance. 

“Why, yes; didn’t I tell you he was my son-in- 
law ? You see, it was this way : Mr. Phillips, Poti- 
phar, is an expert in mining and corporation law; 
you know he is now local attorney for the Saviour 
Oil Co., and is doing splendidly. Well, he happened 
to be at our house during the holidays three years 
ago, called there on business, when Enid came home. 
It was sudden ; she had got into another disgraceful 
scrape lately with some youngster that outraged the 
college and the proprieties and heaven knows what 
all ; her father was so angry that he wouldn’t speak 
to her for a week. You know he was always a hor- 
ribly nervous man, poor dear soul! He seemed to 
have no power to put up with those little stabs and 
shocks that society inflicts even when we lived here 
in the city. So you can see how it was : Mr. An- 
thony, furious; Enid, haughty, independent, devil- 
ish; Potiphar — Mr. Phillips — with a love for com- 
plications and the girl, sympathetic, kind, two clients 
on his hands whose interests were essentially iden- 
tical. Enid laughed at him at first, used to make 
fun of him shockingly ; but there was no dude about 
him and ” 

“I beg your pardon?” said Kenneth, slightly los- 
ing the drift. 

“I said that Potiphar was no dude, of course; and 
therefore,” she coughed, and caught her breath. 

“Yes?” 

“Why, she couldn’t help but respect him.” 

“Oh, no ; I suppose not,” he apologised hastily. 


io8 


GOD'S REBEL . 


“Well, that’s all there was to it. Her father 
swore ; Enid finally broke down, and Potiphar effect- 
ed a compromise and married her. And for once, 
I tell you, I praised the Lord with all my soul.” And 
she laughed, shrugged her shoulders like a general 
after a battle, and added : “Potiphar is such a re- 
liable fellow, you know.” 

They continued to sit there, chatting confiden- 
tially for a space; she calling up old memories of 
his father which made him forgetful of the place and 
hour. She hadn’t met Mabel ; had heard of her, of 
her being a brilliant pianiste and a charming girl, 
quiet, perhaps, but ladylike and refined. She would 
make him such a good wife. Ah, she was so differ- 
ent from Enid ! Still, she was very anxious for him 
to meet Enid, who often spoke of him. “You are 
her oldest memory, her first love,” her eyes twinkled 
and the dimples deepened roguishly as she caught 
him blushing. 

It was shameful ; he was angry with himself for a 
feeling only half understood ; wished she would stop 
talking in this inconsequential fashion, and yet — 
and yet — it strangely fascinated him. Pshaw ! what 
was Enid to him ? He had seen her once since her 
marriage, had touched her hand, seen himself in her 
eyes and not known her. Why should he be called 
upon to meet her again, now, at this late day, only 
to be reminded of some strange, mysterious force 
that hitherto had never entered into his philosophy, 
and with the occult working of which he did not care 
to encumber himself. For one suddenly to lose 
the points of the compass and behold the sun rising 
at the point where it is supposed to have set, is con- 
fusing, blinding, maddening. To walk in darkness 
or twilight is better than following an ignis-fatuus. 
Moreover, the impressions of an infant, a six year 


A RECEPTION. 


109 

old, are not supposed to torment and follow a man 
through life. 

As Mabel now approached he made her take his 
seat beside Mrs. Anthony, bowed, and straightway 
plunged into the maze. 

“Ah, professor,” and a little man with gold spec- 
tacles and smiling face grasped his hand, “glad to see 
you out. It’s a good change; I know you’ve been 
confining yourself very strictly.” And Dr. Little’s 
face expressed genuine anxiety, catholicity and 
courtly solicitude at one sitting. 

Kenneth thanked him, explaining that he had 
found a substitute for that evening. 

“Ah, yes,” acceded the president, “Professor Law- 
rence is a very able man — remarkably able, in fact, 
but conservative. You know a university must al- 
ways be conservative, Dr. Moore ; it won’t do to have 
such a time with our universities in this country as 
they have in Russia. No, it would never do in the 
world. Now, Professor Lawrence is eminently 
safe, you know; teaches on the old lines, Adam 
Smith and Malthus, although I believe he has some 
doubt over Mill and Ricardo, considering them 
somewhat revolutionary, untrustworthy, perhaps. 
But, of course, this is his conservative temperament. 
And, indeed, Dr. Moore, it is in fine contrast with 
your own ; in fact, I congratulate myself every day 
that the university has two such good men in polit- 
ical economy who form such a perfect balance to 
each* other — perfectly balanced, sir, perfectly bal- 
anced;” and Dr. Little waved his soft hand lightly 
to and fro in imitation of a wheel that, fortunately, 
will never be able to make a complete and dangerous 
revolution, but will go only so far and then swing 
back and try it over again ad infinitum. “But still,” 
continued the president, “I have had in mind for 
some time to give you my personal thanks for the 


IIO 


GOD'S REBEL . 


splendid new life you have instilled into a depart- 
ment that hitherto has been shunned. Why, the 
classes have more than doubled, taking yours and 
Dr. Lawrence’s together. Your youth, hope, op- 
timism, even pantheism, perhaps, have accomplished 
wonders. But remember, my dear doctor, that 
truth is a vexed question. I pray you go out more ; 
enjoy yourself; keep your mind always fresh.” 

Kenneth smiled, thanked him, promised to take 
care of his health, and moved on. Luxury, luxury ! 
proud palace of art and delight, let not thy denizens 
be disturbed by wheels that turn over in the hapless 
head of some visionary professor! Be comforted; 
the poor ye have always with you. Bring forth 
your ancient prerogatives, sound the glad cymbals, 
drink, dance, play. Get rid of thy tub, Diogenes! 
Go into society ! Eat good food and take exercise ; 
for heaven’s sake, take exercise! and if you be a 
priest take a vacation. Your position will always be 
waiting for you, and the salary will go on just the 
same. Mens sana in cor pore sano. But let the re- 
ception go on. 

Amid the crowd he met Potiphar. “You are not 
familiar with our company, professor, I believe. 
However, you’ll soon make acquaintances. Now, 
that” — waving a soft, podgy hand in the direction 
of a row of very fat females in very low-necked 
gowns — “that is our particular galaxy of stars; in 
fact, you might even call it our milky-way.” 

He thought the fellow was coarse. Still, if such 
women would dress in that way he knew they de- 
served nothing better. And he passed on, won- 
dering, dreaming; greeting an occasional friend 
here and there, but without seeming to be 
awakened yet to the life of the party. 

“Hello, Kenneth!” Ah, that was Goldsmith- 

Smith ; and over there in the corner sat 


A RECEPTION. 


ill 


Nannette listening to one of Sam Kent’s marvelous 
yarns. But his meeting with Dr. Little had given 
him a curious shock; had made him aware, as did 
every recent conversation with that gentleman, of 
the great chasm that yawned eternally between them. 
It was the bottomless pit where he stood, yet al- 
ready he despaired, nay, even hated the thought of 
ever standing on the peak of Parnassus of which 
that gentleman was alleged to have the pre-emption. 

In the full glow of the light he was passing a 
darkened window-retreat, fragrant of secrecy, 
provocative of lover’s vows, when he heard his name 
called, “Kenneth, Kenneth!” and a hand on the 
sleeve drew him in. 

“Enid!” he cried. 

“Of course. I have been dying to see you since 
you left me your card in the casino. I wanted to 
pay you back your napoleon,” and she turned up a 
face, with lips that invited, openly. 

Ere his heart had beat twice he had answered. She 
laughed. “That makes us quits, I suppose. Come 
in here. Have you met Professor Thurston?” and 
that gentleman rose from his seat in the window. 

“Professor Thurston?” said Kenneth in conster- 
nation; “why ” 

“Yes,” Enid answered coolly. “Mr. Moore and I 
are old friends, Professor Thurston. You know I 
don’t act that way with strangers.” 

Thurston was polite; he granted it. “I have met 
Dr. Moore,” said he, taking his hand, “and am 
engaged to Mrs. Moore for the next waltz, so I shall 
leave you. Mind you don’t do it again, though,” 
and he laughed, passing out in the light. 

“It’s like getting acquainted with you all over,” 
she began. “I scarcely know how to take you.” 

“You have various ways then, perhaps?” he sug- 
gested. 


1 12 


GOD’S REBEL, 


Her eyes flashed. “Now, that is surely unkind,” 
she declared. “I assure you that was quite irregu- 
lar, established a precedent, as Potiphar would say. 
But why didn’t you make yourself known to me 
at Monte Carlo, and what made you run away di- 
rectly I had read your name?” 

He explained. The name she had handed him 
was but one of a thousand ; it signified nothing until 
after he had received his mail from home. 

“Your hair has grown dark,” said he. 

“Yes,” she admitted, “an anomalous change now- 
adays, isn’t it ? Did you like it better light ?” 

Ah, what difference did his liking make? Still 
he looked to see — a long time. 

“Yes, perhaps I did,” he answered simply. 

“You’ve seen my mother, I suppose,” she went 
on, “and she has told you all that’s interesting about 
me. And Potiphar ?” 

“I’ve not had the pleasure to speak with him 
much,” he evaded. 

“Oh, Potiphar doesn’t talk — not unless he has a 
case,” she returned. “But he’s stable, substantial; 
you know right where to place your hands on him 
whenever you want him.” 

He smiled. “Obviously, God made him for a 
husband.” 

She searched his face quickly. “Kenneth, you 
have grown cynical. Why is it?” 

“Indeed ! I beg your pardon,” he protested. “I 
did not mean it.” 

Afterwards he knew not how long they had sat 
there; the music floating in from the ball-room, 
couples scurrying past, dark eyes that lightened and 
went out, and the scent of the jasmine in her hair; 
whilst anon the tide of her fancy, sweeping the scene 
from his mind, carried him back once more to the 
casino. What paths had he travelled and loved; 


A RECEPTION. 


113 

and was Wagner a voice or a crash? She had 
studied vocal — in Paris; Bayreuth threw her into 
despair. No, she never expected to do anything — 
Potiphar didn’t approve of it. Only at home, Gou- 
nod and Schumann and Rubinstein. He must come 
and see them, very often. “We shall always be 
friends, you know !” She gave him both hands, im- 
pulsively. 

They passed into the card room. A couple was 
wanted to take the place of one leaving. Kenneth 
was given a card well covered with gold stars, and, 
to his surprise — for he was but a careless player — 
after playing a few hands he found himself one of 
five fated to cut for a prize. 

“Cut last,” Enid whispered, “and pick the top 
card.” 

The first cut a 'king; the second a nine-spot; the 
third a ten ; the fourth cut an ace ; and Kenneth, to 
the eyes that commanded, chose the top card and lo ! 
’twas likewise an ace. 

The interest was intensified ; the crowd deepened 
round the table, as the winners prepared to cut 
again; and the prize, a bottle-fly scarf-pin of emer- 
alds and rubies, was brought forth. 

“I told you,” laughed Enid, clutching his sleeve 
as the cards were being shuffled. “Be modest; let 
him cut first; then take the top card.” 

His rival found a king; held it up, smiling. 

Again Kenneth turned over the first card, and 
again found an ace. “What witchcraft is in it?” he 
cried, as everyone laughed at his confusion, his 
rival’s disappointment, and Enid clapping her hands. 

“You must be a homeopath, Dr. Moore,” said a 
lady at his side who, knowing the capacious maw of 
the medical profession for that title to the exclusion 
of all other comers, assumed him to be a physician. 

“Madam,” returned the defeated, who happened 
8 


GOD'S REBEL . 


1 14 

to be an irascible representative of the blue pill, “do 
you base your deduction on his success, or the evi- 
dent ostentation of his methods ?” 

“Hush !” and a lady placed her hand on his sleeve. 
“You must really forgive him, Mrs. Simmons,” she 
apologised, “the doctor gets so wrought up over the 
game he is not aware what he says.” 

“Homeopaths are so successful,” simpered Mrs. 
Simmons, confusedly, failing to note that she had 
been the cause of the doctor’s warmth. 

“Yes, madam,” answered he of the old school; 
“it’s excellent in games of chance! Come, Mary, 
let’s go home.” 

“Gambling shows character, don’t you think?” 
said Enid, as she fastened the pin in his lapel. 

“I had a friend once, Dr. Moore,” still persisted 
Mrs. Simmons, “who had a perfect system at Monte 
Carlo.” 

“He broke the bank, possibly,” Kenneth answered 
politely, though bored to his heels and anxious to 
be gone. 

“No, he didn’t break the bank exactly,” she an- 
swered innocently, “but he would have done so if 
his money had only lasted.” 

The music struck up in the ball-room, the rhyth- 
mic swing of the years in its memorial measures. 
“The last waltz,” said Enid. “Oh dear! I am 
engaged.” 

“Irrevocably?” he asked, as they moved towards 
the ball-room. 

She stopped, looked full in his face. Ah, where 
found she those eyes? They were not American, 
nor quite Japanese; but French, perhaps, sometime 
of Scotland — the beacon of Bothwell and Rizzio. 

“I’ll beg an excuse,” she said ; and as they came 
to the door : “One moment !” 

Ah, how he loved the scene! Despise it as he 


A PROFOUND PROBLEM . 


US 

would in his brain, speak of it harshly, scornfully, 
almost with hatred at times as he thought of the 
blank, starved, mutinous faces without, perhaps 
peering in through the pane; the injustice, inequal- 
ity, the deep Dead Sea of despair, with its murmur 
and shriek of waves breaking shoreward — no, even 
this could not quite silence his joy and heart-hunger 
for present happiness. It was part of him, parcel of 
his being. And as Enid again stood before him, 
radiant, lovely, loving and arch, all the clouds swept 
aside as he clasped her, with the trick of the years 
and the law. 

On their way homeward Mabel observed: “You 
seemed to enjoy dancing this evening, Kenneth.” 

He started. “Did I? You know it has been a 
long time — since we went anywhere.” 

“Yes; I know.” 


CHAPTER XI. 

A PROFOUND PROBLEM. 

Mrs. Mason was crocheting; she was likewise 
talking; and Mr. Mason was reading the evening 
newspaper. It was, in fact, a condition of truce, of 
compromise, though words of tremendous signifi- 
cance were doubtless being spoken. But, though 
Mr. Mason occupied his customary position of un- 
conditional surrender and held the white flag appeal- 
ingly in front of his eyes, he could not prevent a 
stray bullet in the form of direct examination hit- * 
ting him in the ear ever and anon, and causing him 
to enter an objection on the ground of its being 
incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial. 

The court silently waived the objection, and Mrs, 
Mason resumed her argument, 


n6 


GOD'S REBEL. 


“I wonder if the paper has anything to say to- 
night about the goings-on down at Wheeling? It’s 
perfectly outrageous the way the people there are 
being stirred up. You see, it all happened this way : 
Kenneth has a friend down there, a physician; 
Holden his name is — Dr. Holden, of course; and I 
think he was studying abroad at the same time Ken- 
neth was. He is said to have been very successful, 
too, especially in fevers. Mrs. Simmons sent for 
him once to come away up here to see her ; and you 
know she’s a homeopath, too, and knows all about 
medicine ; in fact, she has her own medicine-case and 
gives pulsatilla and chamomile and all those powerful 
drugs to her children just like a doctor. So I’m sure 
that Dr. Holden must be an unusually good physi- 
cian if he could please her, and he has a great hold 
on the people. But perhaps you have heard of him, 
Edward?” 

The newspaper rustled negatively. 

“Well, I don’t suppose,” she continued. “Of 
course men don’t have the time to keep track of all 
these things that are working around us to under- 
mine society; they can’t, they are too busy. It’s just 
all a man can do nowadays to work hard all day long 
and support his family decently ; and of course char- 
ity begins at home. I declare I don’t see for the 
life of me how young men are going to get started at 
all after awhile, with all these department stores and 
trusts and corporations competing against them. 
It seems to me that the best thing a young man can 
do is to just get a job when he’s fourteen and stay 
right with it! It doesn’t pay to go to college and 
learn Latin and then become a street-car conductor. 
Still, it’s better to do that than to be stirring up the 
people the way Kenneth is doing down there at 
Wheeling. There’s no sense in that sort o’ thing, 
and if Dr. Moore were living I don’t believe he’d 


A PROFOUND PROBLEM \ 


I1 1 

allow his son to act so; although he used to have 
some very queer notions himself, don’t you think so, 
Edward ?” 

‘‘Notions? Oh, yes; there’s another of those spe- 
cial sales,” he assured her, turning a page. “It takes 
a full page, too.” 

“Where is it, Edward?” she asked, quickly. 

“Really, Helen, I don’t know — Isaacstein’s or 
Moses, Jones and Co. You may have the paper after 
awhile.” 

“Oh, don’t hurry, Edward,” she protested, “don’t 
hurry. Of course I can see it in the morning and 
go in on the train with you. For you know there’s 
no end of things we’ve just got to have and I’ve 
been waiting a whole week for these special sales to 
begin. I declare, I don’t see what the people would 
do without these department stores, and there’s no 
sense in all this outlandish talk of the business-men’s 
association trying to close them up. Isn’t this a free 
country, I should like to know ? and if some people 
aren’t smart enough and bright enough to keep up 
with the procession and become department stores 
themselves, why, then, let ’em close their doors and 
go out of business. Still, it seems pretty hard, I 
suppose, after a man has been in business all his life 
' and attended strictly to it without drinking or gam- 
bling or doing anything bad, to be compelled to close 
his doors and sell his stock out for almost nothing 
and go to work as a common clerk again in one of 
those big stores. But, then, there’s usually some 
cause for it, Edward ; it may be hard to discover at 
first, but you’ll generally find that he has been drink- 
ing or gambling or running after some woman who 
wasn’t his wife ! Oh, yes, you’ll nearly always find 
that’s the way it goes.” And she paused a moment, 
lost in the magnificent perspective of what a city we 
might have when men quit doing these things, so 


GOD’S REBEL . 


118 

that every one of them could be the proud owner 
of a store as big as his neighbour’s — every man his 
own bank president, his own railway king, his own 
owner of a million acres of land, just as soon as he 
quit drinking and smoking and doing other naughty 
things that produce his present damnable economic 
environment. 

“But as I was saying, Edward, you know Kenneth 
was asked by this friend of his, Dr. Holden, to go 
to Wheeling and organise a class in his particular 
specialty — I never can think of that word, but you 
know what I mean, of course. You see, they had 
been having lots of trouble down there about one 
thing and another, and this Dr. Holden had been 
right in the thick of it. If I remember rightly it was 
water that made the first trouble ” 

“Humph ! I didn’t know water ever made trouble 
— thought you just said it was always whiskey?” 
And Edward paused a moment to listen to this re- 
markable circumstance, instance of a new force 
driving men to desperation. 

She looked up, surprised into confusion. “Well, of 
course, Edward, that’s what our minister always 
says — that drink is at the bottom of all this social 
inequality. Still, he may have meant to include 
water?” Mrs. Mason still clutched after a possible 
straw. 

“Undoubtedly,” assured her husband; “if he 
would include food, too, he might perhaps hit the 
mark. But go on.” 

“Well,” she continued, “it’s a prohibition town, 
you know, Wheeling is ; where they make all those 
elegant cars. Mr. Wheeling built the whole town 
and owns all the buildings and houses and streets 
and sidewalks ” 

“And water?” 

“Yes ; he bought the water from the city and sold 


A PROFOUND PROBLEM. 


1 19 

it to the workmen living in his own town for a 
handsome profit. But the people didn’t like it ” 

“What, the water?” 

“No, the profit. Of course, Edward, they were 
foolish and wrong and making an awful fuss about 
a little matter, for I don’t suppose the profit amount- 
ed to more than a dollar on each workman for the 
whole month. But, anyway, the people got all ex- 
cited over it and appealed to Dr. Holden, and he 
persuaded Kenneth to go down there and start a 
class. And now what do you suppose the outcome 
of it all is?” 

“Don’t know, I’m sure.” 

“Why, the people there begin to think that they 
own the town and the entire car works ! Think of 
it, Edward, after Mr. Wheeling and others have 
invested so much capital there!” 

Mr. Mason chuckled, picked up his paper, then 
laid it aside again as he thought of the consternation 
King George and others must have felt when told 
by Jefferson, Franklin, Henry and other demagogues 
that they, the royalists, no longer owned this coun- 
try even if they had invested their capital here, but 
that it belonged to the people. 

“Well, Helen, it proves that the world moves, 
after all,” said he. “It is cruelly, wickedly slow in 
its movements, but the impulse is never quite lost. 
God bless him! let the boy go on with his classes.” 

“Well, I declare !” But there was a note of final- 
ity in the paper’s rustle and Mrs. Mason gasped 
twice and subsided. 

Yet for the past half dozen years, as every one 
knew, the trouble had been gathering at Wheeling. 
In the first years of its existence the town was fa- 
mous the world over as a model town, being un- 
doubtedly planned and outlined on the noblest and 
broadest principles known to its founder and chief 


120 


GOD’S REBEL . 


owner. Schools, library, and other public buildings 
were erected and completely equipped, whilst street 
after street was laid out, fronted with red brick 
houses which were leased to the workmen at a mod- 
erate price. The first years were prosperous ; whence 
the owners did not see fit to devote their time to the 
translation of dreams and parables. If any had 
heard of Pharaoh’s dream of the seven lean kine 
that ate up the seven fat — well, such was only a 
myth, and we were not living in Egypt, but the 
United States! They stored not their produce in 
granaries, but watered their stock freely and stuck 
the proceeds in their pockets. Then came their 
Nemesis in the vain endeavour to earn interest on 
two shares of stock for only one rightfully repre- 
sented. Obviously, there was but one way to do 
it — namely, cut wages. Accordingly they were re- 
duced. Rents, however, remained the same, and it 
being fortunately a prohibition town, there was no 
fear of anyone going to the devil by drinking 
whiskey. Water rates, therefore, were secure. And 
now the pound of flesh was about to be peeled. The 
Doones were secure in their glen, and there was 
a general and wholesome feeling on the part of the 
inhabitants of Exmoor that they couldn’t live with- 
out robbers anyway. They had always had the 
Doones, and feared some terrible calamity if they 
raised their impious hands against those who were 
all lords and gentlemen by birth. A fat heifer now 
and then, a wife, a daughter, a son shot dead at the 
door, the loss of all these could be borne because 
such was the will of Providence ! 

In the midst of this commotion Kenneth had or- 
ganised a class atWheeling for the purpose of teach- 
ing the outlines of economics ; for it was amazing, 
astounding for him to find how little in general the 
public knew of his subject — nay, even the word was 


A PROFOUND PROBLEM. 


121 


unknown. With algebra, geometry and many 
branches of proverbial uselessness the very children 
of the poor were stuffed to the point of idiocy ; the 
binomial theorem and nebular hypothesis fed and 
consumed their grey matter; any one of them was 
capable of finding the locus of a point in space equi- 
distant from three given points not in a straight 
line; but anything as simple as A, B, C which di- 
rectly concerned their economic intelligence and 
was invaluable in fitting them for usefulness as citi- 
zens of a republic, was neither to be thought of nor 
taught. In a monarchy, the professor reflected, there 
might be sufficient reason for putting all studies 
under the ban which tend to dispute the fact of the 
divinity of kings ; to the Roman superstition science 
had been a stab in the heart; but why, under a 
republic whose government is the people, these fun- 
damental principles which go to insure its continu- 
ance, should pass untaught, unhonoured, aye, even 
dishonoured, was beyond Kenneth’s power to fath- 
om. Was it dry; was it uninteresting; was it in- 
famous ? On every hand public discussion obtained, 
and that of the freest, upon religion, morality, ethics ; 
through fiction alone one could delve to the very 
heart of Christianity. But economics, it seemed, 
was a thing merely to fight and quarrel over, and 
hide out of sight with a shudder. Here knowledge 
was expected to be intuitive, and not to come 
through study. 

“Mabel,” he called from the library, “would you 
mind sending this note for me over to Mr. Luding- 
ton ? I’m off to Wheeling again this evening.” 

“You wish him to go with you, Kenneth?” she 
asked, slowly, her tones implying her disapproval. 

He assured her, “Wouldn’t you and Nannette like 
to go, too ?” 

“Oh, no ; nonsense, Kenneth ! I should be out of 


122 


GOD'S REBEL. 


place. Besides, you know how I feel about those 
people.” 

‘‘Oh, but I should, professor,” cried Nannette; “I 
should love to.” 

“Good! I don’t see why, Mabel,” he returned. 
“You would be surprised to see how the people turn 
out and how intently they listen and remember every 
word. At first, you know, hardly anyone came; 
mostly school children, boys and girls who were 
glad of an excuse to get together of an evening even 
if it was only a lecture. But they grew interested 
in the quiz, went home and told their parents, pro- 
voked discussion, and now everyone comes.” 

And such indeed was the fact ; for this evening, in 
spite of the stormy weather without, causing Mr. 
Ludington to send regrets, the little hall where he 
lectured was well filled — workingmen, their wives 
and their families ; neatly dressed, but showing the 
signs of wear; a pinched face here and there, eyes 
hungry and over large that followed his every 
move ; hands that showed years of toil ; the producers 
of wealth and plutocracy and naught of their own to 
show for it. They had come to learn how it hap- 
pened. 

“Tom, will you please give us John Stuart Mill’s 
definition of the essentials for production?” he 
asked, beginning the quiz. 

The man replied, firmly : “Two, professor. First, 
Labour; second, Natural Resources.” 

Of the truth of this definition, both in Mill’s time 
and all time, there had never been any doubt in the 
mind of the class until one evening when Professor 
Lawrence substituted for Kenneth and threw the 
entire class into confusion by declaring that there 
were three essentials for the production of wealth — 
namely: First, Labour; second, Natural Recources, 
and, third, Capital. 


A PROFOUND PROBLEM. 


123 

“How did Professor Lawrence explain that?” 
asked Kenneth, with a smile. 

“Well, sir,” answered a young man, “he said that 
no matter how rich the soil, how luxuriant the grass, 
how fine the climate, how plentiful the iron, the coal 
and the manifold resources of Nature, wealth can- 
not be produced unless human labour performs its 
part.” 

“Exactly; but what about Capital?” 

“Well, sir, he said that when we pass from the 
most primitive age of society, it is found that labour 
cannot be properly employed without capital.” 

Kenneth looked surprised; the idea seemed so 
absurd, so fraught with the monstrous motive 
behind it. 

“I beg your pardon, professor,” added Tom, “but 
I took the liberty to ask him if we were to assume 
then that the thing which ailed India, Ireland, and 
even our coal-miners, was due to lack of capital on 
the part of the employers. I remembered what you 
told us of India, sir, from having seen the country, 
and asked him if he thought the people there would 
all continue to starve to death in that fertile country 
if every capitalistic Englishman would take his cap- 
ital and go home and die.” 

Kenneth laughed. “And what did he say?” 

“Oh, he said my questions were foreign to the sub- 
ject.” 

The lecturer continued : “I believe that is a ques- 
tion which every one of you is competent now to de- 
cide for yourself. Moreover, I will add that au- 
thority is all on your side, and none whatever in 
support of Professor Lawrence. You should re- 
member, too, that wherever capital is the most 
abundant, there wages are always the lowest. Pri- 
vate capital is a gigantic sponge, the thief of labour, 
not its support. For instance, all through the West 


124 


GOD’S REBEL . 


and in California at a time when there practically 
was no capital, wages were high, and so, too, in our 
own city, the reason for this is obvious and 
requires little thought. But let us have Adam 
Smith’s definition of wages? Mike, will you 
give it?” 

“Yis, sor,” answered the Hibernian, grinning all 
over with pleasure. “ The produce of labour con- 
stitutes natural recompense, or wages of labour.’ 
And begorra! whin the gintleman said the produce 
of labour he meant the full produce, not half av it, 
or wan quarther.” 

“You’re right, Mike; there’s not the least doubt 
of it,” Kenneth assured him. “Labour, then, applied 
to natural resources, produces natural recompense 
or wages.” And he continued speaking and show- 
ing how, under the present capitalistic system, la- 
bour gets only one-quarter of its full product, the 
balance accruing to the capitalist and unnecessary 
go-betweens in the shape of profits. 

Surely, these matters were simple enough ; even 
the children understood the truth and significance 
of every word uttered. As a test of mental ability 
to grasp a problem and give its ultimate solution 
these propositions were a mere plaything for the 
mind. Yet not a soul there had ever heard of the 
like in school. They had, many of them, even been 
through the high schools, and a few, college; yet 
they had all come out into life as helpless to grasp 
a proposition in simple economics until now as the 
veriest babe in the woods ; turned adrift into repub- 
lican society, with the fullest franchise of man- 
hood, merely to find themselves the helpless prey of 
the ward-heeler and bum politician at the very first 
election; knowing nothing of the basic economic 
principles which are induced from the broad domain 
of ethics and biology, not to mention early Chris- 


A PROFOUND PROBLEM. 


125 


tianity, and which must continue to be the very tap- 
root of our tree, the life-blood of our republic, lest 
we would drift with scarcely a pause or excuse into 
the wide-open arms of a pilfering plutocracy Good 
God!” he had urged, “it is bewildering, maddening! 
Other countries have some excuse; they make no 
vain boasts of equality of opportunity and republican 
principles. But we? we have business schools to 
teach legalised stealing; law schools to teach the 
superiority of law over justice; Sunday schools to 
teach mythology; but to teach the principles con- 
tained in our Declaration of Independence, we have 
nothing ! nothing ! nothing ! save God and the 
heavens above us.” 

He turned to the children, who had fallen into 
the habit of expecting a question or two during 
the quiz. “Johnny,” said he, picking out a bright- 
faced youngster of about the age of fourteen, “what 
is the cause of poverty, according to the church?” 

“Ignorance, improvidence, drunkenness,” an- 
swered the boy readily, “and because God cursed the 
earth.” 

“Well, what do you think of this doctrine?” 

“I think the church lies, sir,” said the boy. 

“Humph! possibly it does,” the professor con- 
ceded. “Now then, Johnny, you have just learned 
that the labourer does not get the full product of his 
labour wherever industry is conducted for the profits 
of the few instead of the good of the many — that, 
in fact, he only receives about one-quarter of his full 
product, whilst three-quarters are lost to him in 
the shape of interest and profits.” 

“Yes, sir,” assented the boy. 

“Well, then, just suppose that I am a capitalist, 
and that I own all the flour and all the apples and 
propose to start up the paralyzed industries of this 
country by going into the manufacture of apple tarts. 


126 


GOD'S REBEL. 


Therefore I engage you and all the other boys 
whom I find starving and anxious to work for me, 
and agree to give you regular wages in the shape of 
one-quarter of a tart for every tart you make. What 
would be the inevitable result ?” 

“Why, sir, pretty soon you would have a great 
pile of tarts and we should have none.” 

“What! none? you ignorant, improvident, 
drunken children! What have you done with all 
your tarts ?” 

“We had to eat them, sir, as we went along,” an- 
swered Johnnie. 

“Pshaw ! didn’t I have to eat my tarts, too ?” 

“Some of them, sir; but you can’t eat any more 
tarts than I can, and you know it, sir,” Johnnie 
maintained stoutly. 

The professor admitted it, looking at the boy’s 
loose and hungry jacket. “But,” he continued, 
“suppose I should tell you now that I didn’t want 
any more tarts, and that you must all stop work. 
What excuse would I offer?” 

“You would say, sir, that there was an overpro- 
duction', or else lack of confidence,” answered the 
boy in disgust. 

“But couldn’t I sell my pile of tarts and then go 
on with the work again ?” 

“No, sir,” answered the boy, “because all work- 
ingmen are in the same boat as we are. Men who 
make shoes are robbed in the same way and have 
no more money to buy tarts than we have to buy 
shoes.” 

“If you please, professor,” said his friend, Dr. 
Holden, stepping forward, “I should like to demon- 
strate for a moment the benighted ignorance or chi- 
canery displayed by a reputable magazine on this 
question to which the children have just replied. 
This,” he proceeded, holding up the magazine, “is 


A PROFOUND PROBLEM. 


127 


a copy of the Christian Argus , containing a criti- 
cism on a certain new book.” Whereupon he read : 
“ ‘The author explains periods of depression by the 
fact that the labourer gets but half of his product, 
and therefore cannot create (buy back) a demand 
for all he produces. Very true is this conclusion; 
but if the labourer gets but half his product, the 
capitalist gets the other half and the capitalist’s ex- 
penditures create as great a demand for products 
as the labourers.’ 

“Now, what a specious argument is this!” con- 
tinued Holden, indignantly. “For clearly to admit 
that the capitalist does get the other half of every 
labourer’s product, but that he expends it himself 
for commodities, is a lie on the face of it. Else wealth 
would never pile up so that to-day nine per cent 
of our people own forty-five billions of the nation’s 
entire wealth of sixty-two billions. Now, is any 
magazine so foolish as to fancy it possible for Mr. 
Rockland to consume his daily income of fifty thou- 
sand dollars for commodities even if he chose? Why, 
he can eat no more apple tarts than Johnnie! If it 
were possible for our millionaires to do this, of 
course we should not witness so frequently what is 
falsely called overproduction; if the capitalists who 
owned the water tank could only have drunk more 
buckets of water the tank would never have over- 
flowed. But it’s a lying impossibility, and the editor 
of this Christian magazine must know it!” 

Over this question of the effects of the profit sys- 
tem, a system in which, for every dollar the labourer 
created seventy-five cents was filched from him — ac- 
cording to the lecturer — and with the sanction of 
church and society, the discussion continued 
awhile. Afterward, when the meeting adjourned, 
the professor made Nannette acquainted with some 
of the people, among them Holden and his wife. 


128 


GOD’S REBEL . 


“Is this Dr. Holden the same that the papers 
were full of a short time ago, professor?” Nannette 
asked, curiously, as they were on the way home. 

“Yes, and his wife. Her father, Mr. James 
Dana, is one of the principal owners in the car works. 
How did you like her?” 

“Oh, I thought she was charming. I don’t blame 
her husband for running away with her. Still, I 
should think it might be a trifle unpleasant to hear 
her father referred to by her husband as a robber. 
Don’t you think so?” 

“Naturally,” he replied; “you see, money divides 
people even worse than religion. Her marriage was 
bitterly opposed. However, Dr. Holden meant 
nothing personal in his remarks ; what he condemns 
is the whole unfortunate system, not the individual.” 

For a space she said nothing as they rode on in 
the night; then, finally: \ “Really, professor, I’m 
ashamed to acknowledge it, but the little that I’ve 
heard to-night has come as a revelation to me. Do 
you know, I’ve never actually thought before of the 
causes that created these great inequalities in society, 
and never so much as dreamed that the solution was 
a mere matter of arithmetic as simple as A, B, C. 
Only, why is it, if these things are so simple, that 
the people do not act?” 

The professor smiled. “Because, my dear, whilst 
those things we spoke of to-night may now seem 
obvious enough to you, to the majority this is still 
the ‘profound social problem.’ Why, there are 
hundreds of public men, judges on the bench, even, 
who know less of economics than those children 
there to-night. Moreover, few men of wealth and 
influence are honest enough to consider the question 
fairly. For myself, in all my observation, and after 
fairly searching the literature of the world, I have 
failed to find one single refutation of the malevo- 


REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE. 


129 


lent part played in our economic life by the mainte- 
nance of Rent, Interest, and Profits. Christ knew 
it and condemned it. The whole system is a lie, a 
relic of monarchy that none can adequately defend ; 
and none but a fool or a knave ever tries it. And the 
poverty that I see, and the suffering! Oh, it is 
maddening to behold these things and know the 
cause ! Were I so ignorant or vicious as to accept 
it all as something designed by God, and so calmly 
repeat, 'the poor ye have always with you,’ in har- 
mony with the good people who go to church, then 
of course I could forget it — could regard poverty 
as inevitable. Modern Christianity is such a com- 
fortable sop, you know ; it has a never-failing excuse 
for every evil under the sun. Obviously, that’s what 
it is for. The church is no longer at war with con- 
ventional evil, but is one with it.” 


CHAPTER XII. 

REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE. 

To Mabel’s persistent disappointment, the even- 
ings continued to come and go that winter without 
their seeing very much of society ; and, though she 
protested frequently and valiantly, it was of no use; 
her husband continually seemed to have some other 
matter on hand that he fancied was of greater im- 
portance. To be sure, Nannette’s coming had en- 
livened their household considerably ; her novel, true 
to Mr. Kent’s judgment, had made a hit, and the 
author was now riding the top wave of local popu- 
larity. Consequently she was not lacking for 
friends; invitations poured in upon them, causing 
9 


130 


GOD'S REBEL . 


that young woman to clap her hands and cry inno- 
cently : “Oh, isn’t it just perfectly jolly !” Whereto 
the professor agreed, courteously, though for his 
part he preferred the quieter evenings at home, with 
music and a few friends. 

“We have an invitation for to-morrow evening, 
Kenneth. You will go with us, of course?” 

They were seated at dinner; dessert had been 
served ; and at such a time if ever, thought Mabel, 
a man might forget his political-economy. 

“I’m awfully sorry, Mabel; but, really, I can’t 
go. I wish you would ask Smith or Mr. Kent.” 

Mabel flushed ; this had become his usual answer. 
“Dear me, Kenneth ! How provoking and mean you 
can be,” she cried. “You never even wait to ask 
who it is.” 

“But, Mabel,” he began, “if it were the queen 
of Sheba ” 

Nannette giggled. “No, it’s some other charming 
Egyptian. Guess again.” 

“In fact, it’s from Mrs. Phillips, Mrs. Potiphar 
Phillips, I believe,” Mabel urged, with sarcasm. 
“Does this make no difference with your refusal ?” 

“Ah, did she call ?” he evaded. He knew — no, he 
felt — that Mabel did not like her. “I’m sorry I 
wasn’t at home,” he added recklessly. 

“I’ve no doubt,” Mabel laughed. “You would, of 
course, have accepted immediately her invitation to 
dinner. Really, I never saw you so bewitched with 
anyone in my life!” 

He looked up suddenly. “What in the world do 
you mean, Mabel ?” 

“Pshaw! if you hadn’t been so innocent you 
wouldn’t have been so attracted by her. You know 
she is fast, and a flirt, and paints dreadfully ! Why, 
there was paint on the lapel of your coat, and you 
danced with no one but her.” 


REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE . 131 

Nannette opened her eyes very wide, but said 
nothing. 

“Nonsense!” he protested; “I declare it was that 
old lady Simmons. You know her. She was so 
fascinated with me that she fairly kept her head 
on my shoulder all the time I sat at cards. What 
a nuisance that old lady is!” 

Mabel only laughed, incredulously, somewhat 
unpleasantly. 

“Neither have I ever heard that Mrs. Phillips 
paints, flirts, or is fast,” he continued, “and I’ve 
known her for over twenty years.” 

“Twenty years? You never told me!” 

“I didn’t think it necessary. You met Mrs. An- 
thony; I supposed she told everything.” Mabel 
shook her head; Mrs. Anthony had spoken only 
of his father, she explained; besides she had only 
sat beside her a moment. “But I wish you and 
Mrs. Phillips might be friends, Mabel,” he urged 
frankly, without pausing to analyze the desire. “I 
think you would find her interesting. You’ve met 
her, Nannette?” 

“Yes; she has been very kind to me. I think she 
is lovely.” 

“But they are awfully wealthy, Kenneth,” Mabel 
pursued; “I couldn’t be very intimate with her, any- 
way — unless you quit teaching school and go into 
business. Still, I don’t like her; she is one of those 
women men seek — favoured and favouring.” 

Whereupon he battled for her; declared the 
charge was fallacious, invidious, founded in old- 
maidish myopia. Potiphar’s wife was unquestion- 
ably better than her reporters — as was invariably 
the case. “Her life has been different from yours, 
Mabel; less restrained, perhaps, that is all.” 

At any rate he contrived to accept the invitation 
for the following evening, which accordingly found 


1 3 2 


GOD’S REBEL. 


them composing part of a little company of men 
and women such as are commonly styled represent- 
ative people. Potiphar sat at the head of the table; 
filled it, graced it, ornamented it; his face beaming 
broadly, flushed with the labour of hospitality. 
Moreover he was the sort of man that invariably 
looks well in such a position. In fact there was 
a tradition — which others called a joke — to the 
effect that he had once been mistaken at a recep- 
tion for the butler; wherefore he had ever after- 
wards evinced a strong desire to be seated as much 
of the time as consistent when out at social gather- 
ings, which was but natural, and creditable to 
his amour propre. A gentleman can’t be supposed 
to be tagged and labelled in order to disarm the 
suspicion of his fellows; he should be inferred, de- 
duced, divined! 

The conversation fell upon immortal topics; the 
horse-show, the theatre, and the latest and grand- 
est reception that had stirred up so much discussion 
all over the country. The sentiment was practically 
unanimous; they were all a wonderful benefit, a 
blessing in disguise to the poor. Kenneth listened, 
patiently, satirically, oddly amused; the time had 
long since ceased for him to be either astounded or 
amazed; the point was to accept it sweetly, good- 
humouredly. “The ingratitude of the poor,” he 
observed, “is surely becoming a thing to cause our 
universal disgust.” 

“Yes,” replied Potiphar, piling a plate that was 
passed, “of course they are not capable of under- 
standing such matters. Yet it is a fact that the 
woman who, as she believes, under the impulse of 
vanity orders a new garment, is contributing largely 
to the increase of commodities throughout the 
world, and consequently is helping the poor.” 

There was a familiar twang to the words, Ken- 


REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE. 


133 


neth thought, reminding him forcibly of the speech 
attributed to a certain orator of the gold-demo- 
crat party; and again, of reading only the night 
before that a well-known gambler had said that the 
various gambling houses of the city — aside from 
the board-of-trade — gave employment to twenty- 
five hundred men at wages ranging from two to 
ten dollars per day. This also must help the poor, 
he had thought. 

“And whenever I refill and empty my glass,” 
added Enid, “some poor fellow should feel well-fed 
and well-drunk, vicariously, and hence should be 
gloriously grateful towards me. Political-economy 
is certainly very comforting; don’t you think so, 
Mr. Priestly?” 

Mr. Priestly hesitated, coloured slightly. As 
their pastor, he hated to express the first dissenting 
note, to strike the first discord and see himself 
literally the skeleton at the feast. He attempted, 
therefore, to dodge as gracefully as possible be- 
hind what has been the bulwark of the church for 
the past thousand years, and replied: “Of course 
it is ignorance, improvidence and drunkenness 
which are at the bottom of the people’s poverty.” 
But beholding part of his body exposed after this 
declaration, knowing in fact that it was not a bullet- 
proof coat and that he was likely to receive a fatal 
shot from Professor Moore, who sat opposite, smil- 
ing and saying little, he added hastily — 

“Of course, Mrs. Phillips, there is another side to 
this question; there are always two sides to a ques- 
tion,” and he turned over the breast of a young 
chicken on his plate, one side of which was bare, the 
other covered with meat. “Now there is our bishop, 
you know, who says in these words — and indeed 
they are his words; I am in no manner responsible 
for them — h’m ! if I recall them correctly, he says : 


134 


GOD’S REBEL. 


The amiable sophistry that luxury and extrava- 
gance put money in circulation and so promote a 
beneficent expenditure, becomes, in the face of our 
modern civilization with its complex and tremen- 
dous social problems, simply a monstrous imper- 
tinence.’ ” 

Murmurs of tremendous disapproval arose; 
knives and forks were suspended, remained sta- 
tionary; signs of some terrible social upheaval. 
“But of course,” added Mr. Priestly, confusedly, 
looking appealingly at Kenneth, who merely 
laughed in return, “those are not my words, ladies 
and gentlemen!” And he inwardly cursed a mem- 
ory that had the power of retaining such anar- 
chic utterances, and the young face opposite, with 
its honest, forceful eyes, that had driven him into 
repeating such for his own protection. No; im- 
providence, ignorance, and drunkenness were good 
enough for him in the future; let this be a lesson 
to him! 

Mr. Frederick Worth, one of the editorial writers 
an the Republican , muttered something abrupt 
about “blatant bishops who ought to be in jail.” He 
couldn’t see for the life of him what the country 
was coming to, if men whom we had a right to 
suppose had common-sense continued to talk in 
that way and incited the people to discontent and 
rebellion. “It’s outrageous,” he avowed, “that 
such profound questions should to-day be agitating 
the mind of every Tom, Dick and Harry; it re- 
quires a great mind to grasp and master them.” 
Mr. Worth had begun life as a printer’s devil, and 
had risen steadily to reporting and editorial writ- 
ing. The only economist he had ever read was 
Malthus. Obviously he was the person to guide 
and teach the general public. 

The bishop was thereupon quickly damned, bur- 


REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE. 


135 


ied, and his obituary editorial written with much 
gusto and flourish of trumpets by Mr. Worth, who 
admitted that he was possibly a great man but had 
laboured all his life under a huge mistake; a sincere 
soul, but narrow, visionary, causing us to deeply de- 
plore the fact that a Creator who had manifestly en- 
dowed him with so much strength and earnestness 
should yet have seen fit to allow His servant to go so 
far astray from the beaten paths, dwelling in bogs, 
sleeping in pitfalls, subsisting simply on Dead Sea 
fruit. Whilst Mr. Priestly breathed a silent prayer 
over the remains, and the conversation again re- 
turned to its legitimate and God-given purpose of 
entertainment. 

“Will you come and play an accompaniment, 
Kenneth, after awhile?” Enid asked, as the women 
rose to pass out, leaving the men over their wine 
and cigars. 

He shook his head. “Mabel is the pianiste, you 
know.” 

“Oh, that’s too bad. All that’s fairest you’ve 
forsaken.” 

He laughed. But again he felt that music 
was ceasing to interest him. In the pressure 
of other work calling for emotional activity music 
had ceased to be a force. It was too aimless, too 
indeterminative, even too soulless. And though 
he never himself had analyzed it, one saw it was 
merely the cry of the heart of humanity that held 
him, the surging minor chord with its haunting 
melody that came welling up from the past, sound- 
ing the key to the present, and echoing down the 
future till it was one again with the harmonies of 
the spheres. The eternal rhythm of life sang for- 
ever in his ears; Wagner, Berlioz, Beethoven knew 
it, had given it voice and expression; but as for 
him, no; his mission, though none the less holy, 


GOD’S REBEL . 


136 

was not to speak in sounds. In Germany, perhaps, 
he might have been a musician, but the environ- 
ment of an industrial Western city had laid hands 
upon him, and being thrilled and inspired with 
the fact that all careers which make for truth are 
essentially one and the same, he felt amply satis- 
fied with his choice. 

“What course is the law going to take with those 
tramps in the West, Mr. Phillips ?” asked the ubiqui- 
tous Worth. “I presume you read that account of 
their capturing a train?” 

“Oh, yes,” puffed Potiphar; “they are on their 
way to Washington,” and he laughed. “They pro- 
pose to capture in its lair the beast that has so long 
been strangling them.” 

“But surely, Mr. Phillips, there must be some 
law to make them disperse,” urged Mr. Priestly, 
anxiously. “Won't somebody get out a — an in- 
junction?” 

“Oh, I suppose so,” Potiphar answered careless- 
ly; “but what's the use? Let them take a trip and 
see the country.” 

“For my part,” again spoke Mr. Worth seriously, 
“I believe with Dr. Priestly that measures should 
be immediately taken to disperse them. The whole 
movement and organisation of these tramps, these 
‘Commonwealers’ is a threat to overthrow our gov- 
ernment and society. This excuse of theirs that 
they seek work is all poppy-cock! Don't you think 
so, professor?” 

He had feared it was coming; feared it, that is, 
because he dislike*d an argument of this kind when 
he knew beforehand that it was not a desire to get 
at the truth, a request for information that the com- 
pany wanted, but merely a chance to air its no- 
tions, its prejudices, to shoot at the mark with him- 
self for a target. He was familiar with the ex- 


REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE. 


1 37 


perience, having once had an affair of this sort to 
a finish with his Aunt Helen, wherein that tribula- 
tion of talkativeness had literally mopped the floor 
with him. “I tell you, I just did speak my whole 
mind out for once, Edward,” she explained to 
her husband afterwards; which caused that gentle- 
man to sigh and congratulate himself inordinately 
on his escape, whilst sensible at the same time of 
an infinite pity for Kenneth; for his wife had never 
spoken her “whole mind” to him at one sitting, but 
had doled it out to him gradually in accordance 
with the state of his health. 

“No, gentlemen,” Kenneth answered quietly, “I 
confess that I do not see it in that light. To me 
this movement is but a sign, a hand on the dial, 
which our governing class would do well to note. 
Men do not do these things for fun, nor for the 
sake of caricaturing themselves in the magazines 
and newspapers. On the contrary, is it not, rather, 
a sad commentary on civilization to be thus shown 
again that any and all reforms, in this or any other 
age, have always arisen from the pinching poverty 
and grinding slavery of the proletarian which 
causes him to rebel, rather than from the noble and 
generous initiative of the wealthy and powerful?” 

“But surely, professor,” protested Mr. Worth 
with a deprecatory laugh, “you do not take this 
thing seriously, do you? You have no idea that 
these men really want work?” 

He hesitated. “My opinion,” he answered mod- 
estly, “is of no moment in a matter of this kind — 
or at most it is merely my opinion. I presume that 
no one present has lately experienced the trial of 
searching for a job and not finding it. Still, one 
knows without trying it that if he were to throw 
himself in front of a freight-train it would probably 
crush him. Less than twenty-five years ago we 


138 


GOD’S REBEL . 


practically had no unemployed in this country; to- 
day we have over a million. Under such condi- 
tions, a hundred men waiting for every available 
position, what chance has a man searching for a 
job?” 

Mr. Priestly murmured, yes; he knew the con- 
ditions were very sad, very distressful. Still, he 
never liked to quote figures; they tended to excite 
and inflame the listener, and we should, of course, 
be particularly cautious in speaking of such things 
out loud, above a whisper, in fact, for it would 
never do to permit the masses to feel that we un- 
derstood the justice of their claims, as it would 
likely stir up violence against us for procrastinat- 
ing. He was thankful, however, for Professor 
Moore’s speaking of it so plainly in their presence 
where, he felt sure, it need occasion no violence, 
no alarm. 

“You feel satisfied, professor, I suppose,” asked 
Potiphar deliberately, “of the accuracy of your fig- 
ures?” 

“Personally, no;” he answered. “I believe they 
are too low; the number of unemployed is nearer to 
four million than to one.” 

Mr. Worth said nothing. Privately, he believed 
both Priestly and Moore to be anarchists in dis- 
guise, wholly discreditable, and that “there was no 
man in the whole damned country really out of a 
job who wanted one.” Giant visionists! addle- 
pated demagogues! men with trolleys in their heads 
that would set fire to the very lake! As for him, he 
had never had any trouble in getting a job. Still, 
he might be more valuable than other men. He 
at least would admit that — it was only fair! 

“It is of course a peculiar condition,” the pro- 
fessor continued; an anomaly, but none the less 
inevitable. You see, machinery has played its re- 


REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE . 


139 


lentless role with our workingmen; with every new 
year more men have been displaced by new machin- 
ery than can expect to find employment in new in- 
dustries. Moreover, we read every morning of 
the organization of some new trust. Why, it is 
an age of trusts, and every one of them acts merely 
as a giant labour-saving machine. Now, these 
things are not a curse in themselves, but should be 
a blessing; and when society finally opens its eyes 
and decides to operate these trusts for its own bene- 
fit, all our evils will vanish and we shall thank God 
for the tendencies that created them.” 

The table gasped and caught its breath, all the 
way from Potiphar to the editorial writer. It was 
a most astounding scheme of robbery and spolia- 
tion of the rich for the benefit of the beggars, the 
fleecing of the divine few for the compensation of 
the scripturally condemned many. There seemed 
to be no one present who agreed with him or who 
had ever heard of such a monstrous piece of in- 
iquity before, except Mr. Kent. But that gentle- 
man said nothing, nor did Kenneth blame him. 
He knew how Kent felt; knew the basis of his 
unique position as a critic, and that when Kent 
spoke at all on such subjects it was merely in para- 
bles which left the public free to accept or decline 
as it chose — as its ignorance dictated. Moreover, 
the more Mr. Kent had gone into society, the more 
reason he had found for wearing always that ad- 
mired and admirable garb of the devil which we 
term negation. In private, they often laughed 
over it and agreed; but in public, when the current 
was turned on flashing and sputtering, the posi- 
tive pole must expect no help from the negative. 

But the subject was not pursued. For, though 
Kenneth was an enthusiast, he was as yet no 
fanatic; a lover, not a hater, of society; and enough 


140 


GOD’S REBEL . 


had already been said to warn him. His subject 
was hated, that was obvious; time and again he 
had proved that gentlemen would have none of it, 
it was only the poor who drank it in great thirsty 
gulps. Well, he would let his enthusiasm flow in 
some other channel; society generally warmed 
towards him when he was as other men. Why 
should he be supposed to defend the truth when- 
ever and wherever? 

They passed into the drawing-room, where Enid 
immediately took him to task for not having called. 
“Aren’t we going to be friends?” she asked. “You 
never come to see us, and we never meet you out 
anywhere.” 

Some one was singing in the parlour adjoining, 
Mabel accompanying him at the piano; a tenor 
voice and one of rare sweetness. 

She continued: “Potiphar says you are butting 
your brains out against corporations?” 

He made no answer. They had strolled into the 
music-room and stood in front of the pipe-organ. 
“Ah, do you play, Enid?” he asked. 

She shook her head. “Oh, a little, but I’ve given 
up music lately. I think I prefer books. Let us sit 
here. Don’t you?” 

“No, not if I were you,” he sighed; “books are 
the instrument of the devil; they cause people to 
think, and thinking breeds discontent, thence strife, 
rebellion, revolution.” 

She smiled. “Indeed! I’m glad to hear you con- 
fess it.” And picking up a little book from a stand 
at her side, she asked: “Are you fond of Renan?” 

He glanced at her. At least Mabel was mis- 
taken about that paint! Let her heart be what it 
might, there was no guile on those cheeks or the 
blushing rose of her lips. 

He waved his hand lightly, in satirical protest. 


REPRESENT A TI VE PEOPLE. 


141 

“No, not particularly,” he replied. “What is it?” 
He might have been fond of Machiavelli at such 
a moment. 

She turned the leaves hastily. “Oh, I think he 
is delightful. This is ‘The Story of My Youth.’ 
You know there is one place here that made me 
think of you, Kenneth.” 

“Dear me!” 

“Yes. Don’t be so sarcastic! You know it was 
after that uprising in 1848. He was disappointed. 
Don’t you want to hear what he says?” 

“Go on.” 

The music had ceased, and she read from the 
page, in low tones — 


“ ‘As I had a well-balanced mind I saw that the ideal and 
the reality have nothing in common; that the world is, at 
all events for the time, given over to what is commonplace 
and paltry; that the cause which generous souls will em- 
brace is sure to be the losing one; that the affairs of the 
world were never so well managed as when the idealists 
had no part or lot in them. Therefore I accustomed myself 
to follow a very singular course; that is, to shape my prac- 
tical judgments in direct opposition to my theoretical judg- 
ments, and to regard as possible that which was in contra- 
diction to my desires. A somewhat lengthy course had 
shown me that the cause I sympathized with always failed, 
and that the one which I decried was certain to be tri- 
umphant. The falser a political solution was, the brighter 
appeared to me its prospect of being accepted into the world 
of realities. I was taught the high value of evil, and that 
the cynical disavowal of all sentiment, generosity, and chiv- 
alry gave pleasure to the world at large and is invariably 
successful.’ ” 


142 


GOD’S REBEL. 


She placed the book aside, sitting with hands 
clasped over one knee. 

Turning round on the organ-seat, he struck the 
keys; the profound but groping chords of the 
Tannhaiiser overture marched majestically forth. 

“Oh, those words are contemptible! contempti- 
ble!” pausing with sudden indignation. “I am 
surprised, overwhelmed with their pessimism in the 
face of our splendid progress. Are those words 
really Renan’s ?” 

Enid smiled. She loved enthusiasm, going hand 
in hand with youth and sound health. “Of course; 
there is the book,” she answered. “And when 
prophets disagree whom shall we trust?” 

“But Enid, you forget; you do not consider!” he 
protested. “Nor did I know that you were inter- 
ested, particularly ” 

“Oh, in a literary way,” she admitted indolently, 
“how can the most careless of creatures avoid the 
subject nowadays?” Still, she was sane, was no 
missionary; in fact, she had once sent her ship to 
Africa; and she laughed at him mischievously over 
the remembrance. 

“Yes, yes,” he protested, “but you must remem- 
ber that mortals, after all, are merely mortals. The 
stress of life finally becomes so severe, so enormous 
as to sunder the very heartstrings. Prophets have 
their days of gloom and despair along with the 
least — and the Greatest — of men. Christ’s cry on 
the cross: ‘My God, why hast thou forsaken me!’ 
No, we must take the man’s life in its totality. 
Renan fought a great battle. Does not jthat battle- 
field still give the lie to the despairing words you 
quoted?” 

Ere she could find words to reply the piano 
again preluded, with Nannette’s violin obligato, and 
a richer voice blended with the tenor’s. The song 


REPRESENTATIVE PEOPLE. 


143 


they had chosen was that saddest of all sweet 
things, wonderful creation of those two men, poet 
and priest alike, Charles Kingsley and Charles Gou- 
nod: “O that we two were maying, down the 
stream of the soft spring breeze.” Like a prayer 
it rose, sweet and solemn, the rhythmic roll of its 
ocean flooding and ebbing, and breaking with the 
crescendo upon the sands, far stretching and silent, 
but retreating with the hopeless weight of earth 
over all, whilst the dying breath and despairing 
cry of Christ was in its cadence. 


"Oh that we two were sleeping, 

In our nest in the churchyard sod, 

With our limbs at rest, on the quiet earth’s breast, 
And our souls at home with God.” 


“Ah, had he known it, too?” Kenneth murmured 
softly; “dear old pugilistic Parson Lot?” 

She made no answer, and he proceeded. “You 
should know, though, that this reform movement 
is no longer based on sentiment, thank heaven! 
but arithmetic.” 

“How do you mean, please?” she asked, seeing 
that she had lost to him after all. 

“Why, in this manner. All this opposition on 
the part of the wealthy towards the demands of the 
labourer arises from the veriest ignorance of the 
principles of addition and subtraction in economics. 
The rich men claim that two and two make eight, 
or that one from five leaves seven. Furthermore, 
he gets violent and acts like a child if you seek to 
teach him arithmetic, saying that it is a profound 
subject and that he is not capable of mastering it; 
insomuch that to-day the average farmer in Kan- 
sas knows more of finance than the average banker 
in Wall street,” he went on to explain, briefly. 


144 


GOD’S REBEL. 


She was surprised; knowing naught, as she ac- 
knowledged, of this mathematical side of the move- 
ment. “I thought it was merely because man hated 
to see his brother starve. And you don’t go ‘slum- 
ming,’ either?” she asked. 

No, he did not go “slumming;” doubting, in 
fact, whether there would ever be a great intellec- 
tual movement along that line. 

“Still, it was great fun, you know,” she persisted. 
“You have no idea how horribly tired one gets 
before the winter is over with these dinners, dances, 
concerts and theatres! But a slumming party, and 
a big policeman” — she launched into an amusing 
description of that popular pastime. “It makes one 
feel like a Christian,” she a*dded. 

“Yes, I can understand that,” he conceded sar- 
castically: “the chief glory and delight of a Chris- 
tian — either individual or nation — consists in wit- 
nessing others less fortunately situated than him- 
self. Then he can speak, in sooth, of Christianity 
and progress going hand in hand! It is extremely 
unctuous.” 

She looked up at him swiftly. “Aren’t you grow- 
ing bitter, Kenneth?” 

“No — I don’t know. Anyway, I hate frauds!” 

“You always did, unfortunately. I think, though, 
it is temperamental — when one is like that. 
Others are fully as cognizant of fraud, perhaps, as 
you are; yet they pass on and say nothing. And 
so I can’t help wishing, often — do you mind? — that 
you ha*d not gone into this. There were other 
paths for you.” 

It was tempered with a smile. 

He stirred uneasily. “Thank you. I did not 
know you ever thought of it. It is very — very 
thoughtless in you to do so, I’m sure.” 

She frowned, her hand resting on his knee. “You 


A WINTER AFTERNOON 


145 

are unkind. Why can you not be reasonable? If 
you knew what I have heard!” 

“I can imagine it,” he answered. “I am an anar- 
chist, of course, seeking to overthrow perfect so- 
ciety. What a pretty ring that is!” He touched 
one of the gems on her fingers. 

“Do you like it?” She rose, wearily. “It was a 
prize.” 

“Indeed?” 

“Yes, I won it; I played my ace, unconsciously, 
on a ten-spot. Come; let us go and find Potiphar.” 

He rose; she took his arm. “Don’t you think,” 
he asked, half laughing, “that you are a little per- 
verse?” 


CHAPTER XIII. 

A WINTER AFTERNOON 

A change had come over Mr. Goldsmith-Smith, 
and not of a fine subtility, but obvious to everyone. 
The habit of his organism had become strangely 
milder, less erratic and more methodical; forces 
that erstwhile passed wholly imperceptible to him 
were now playing upon his plastic and embryonic 
extremities; hence if now and then he was surpris- 
ing his friends with the fruits of his literary labour, 
such was nothing to the way he was astounding 
himself at every turn. 

Much of this arose, unquestionably, from the 
remarkable sale of his firm’s first successful publi- 
cation, The Desert Isle. There may have been 
other incentives, but this fact had at least lent hope 
to his heart, point to his business rapier. No longer 
did he come lounging into the office at a late hour 
in the week, with a “Hello, Sam! Have you heard 

from ,” mentioning some famous female au- 

10 


GOD'S REBEL. 


146 

thor, and with vivid hallucinations of gold tumbling 
into the office from the sun and the moon and the 
far-off misty stars. No; his desk was always found 
open and himself hard at work before it by eight 
o’clock every morning — Sundays not excepted. A 
few responses had come, to be sure, from some 
illustrious litterateurs, respectfully asking what ran- 
som he could afford to pay for an unborn manu- 
script. Whereto he had deigned no reply; circum- 
stances had changed since the time when Sam had 
written those letters. 

His own pen, moreover, had acquired of late a 
pith and flavour altogether unknown to his former 
style. Only this morning he had drawn a manu- 
script out of his overcoat pocket and thrown it on 
Sam’s desk with a “Give it the devil, old man, and 
hand it back.” But when Sam had complied and 
returned it to him late in the afternoon, there were 
no traces of his sulphurous majesty nor even his 
associate sign of the cross along the clean white 
margin. 

“Oliver,” said he sincerely — the “old man” 
speaking, of course, not the “old boy” — “Oliver, 
that’s the best piece of work you’ve ever done. It’s 
almost good enough to print.” Which was high 
praise for Sam. “Hard work agrees with you; a 
love story, of course, but in a wonderfully broader 
strain.” 

Oliver’s face flushed. It was the first criticism he 
had ever enjoyed, ever valued — and he himself was 
conscious of the change. 

“Yes,” he confessed; “I believe it is hard work 
that does it, Sam. It stirs the passions, you know. 
That reminds me, I have discovered a misplaced 
word on the two-hundred-and-thirteenth-page of 
Miss Nielsen’s book. Did you know of it?” 

Obviously, Oliver was becoming a close reader. 


A WINTER AFTERNOON 


14 7 


“Oh yes,” Sam answered coolly. “I was intending 
to tell her our new edition would have a new plate.” 

“Oh, no, Sam, you needn’t trouble about it. I 
was going to tell her myself.” 

“No trouble, I assure you, Oliver; I’m going to 
call this afternoon.” 

“This afternoon?” he cried. “Why, I was start- 
ing there this very moment.” 

“Very well,” Sam agreed, closing his desk with 
a snap. “I’ll ride with you in just a second.” 

Five minutes later this publishing house might 
have been seen walking down the street, wholly 
absorbed in a little business call it was about to 
make relative to a minute change in one of its 
publications. All of which is but a trifling little 
incident, perhaps, yet proving beyond peradven- 
ture that infinite regard for detail and incompara- 
ble courtesy for which young men in the publishing 
business are so commonly celebrated and esteemed. 

“I wonder what the professor has done with his 
manuscript, Oliver. Did you ever hear him say ?” 

“No. I hope he’s burned it, for the sake of his 
reputation.” 

“Nonsense! It should have been published; only 
we were not in a position to do so.” 

“Of course not,” Oliver assented positively. 
“Anyway, I think he’s making an ass of himself.” 

Sam evaded the issue. “Do you know,” he asked 
thoughtfully, “how it was he came to marry his 
cousin?” 

Oliver removed his cigar. “By Jove! You do 
have such a faculty, Sam, for turning things upside 
down. No, I never heard how he came to marry 
his cousin, but I’ve often wondered how his cou- 
sin came to marry him.” 

“Oh.” 

“Yes; she is a very accomplished girl. As for 


148 


GOD'S REBEL . 


Moore — well, he’s not balanced right, you know. 
And he’s such a confounded prig !” 

“What do you mean by a prig, Oliver?” 

“Oh, one of those fellows who are eternally trying 
to tell the world something.” 

Sam chuckled. “Jesus Christ must have been an 
awful prig — when one thinks of it.” 

It was a short walk to the old Moore house. 
When they entered, Mabel was practising a vocal 
exercise in the parlour, and Nannette was copying 
a manuscript on the typewriter for the professor. 
“Let it go, Nannette,” he called; “I’m in no hurry, 
you know.” 

“Oh, no, professor, I’m nearly through,” rattling 
away. “I’m sure you’ll excuse me just a minute, 
won’t you, Mr. Kent?” she continued, as Sam took 
a seat by her side. 

“Oh, certainly. May I talk, or must I keep 
still?” 

“No, please talk,” she urged. “You see, I don’t 
have to think.” 

“When I talk?” 

“No, of course; when I write.” 

“Ah, I should suppose it would be a great com- 
fort not to think when one writes,” he suggested. 
“Now I speak of it, I have in mind several other 
authors whose work indicates their use. But didn’t 
you have to think once or twice when writing The 
Desert Isle?” 

She laughed. “Oh, no; I thought first, you see; 
then I just rattled it off. However, I’m not re- 
sponsible for this stuff. This is the professor’s. I 
don’t know whether there’s any thought in it or 
not. Professor,” she called, “Mr. Kent wants to 
know if a person has to think when he writes this 
sort of thing?” 

Kenneth laughed. “He ought to know that 


A WINTER AFTERNOON 


149 


without asking. It’s only political-economy, Mr. 
Kent, and neither the writer nor the reader is sup- 
posed to waste any time in thinking over it. It 
only concerns the bread and butter of the many, 
whereas if it were some fairy tale or something on 
ecclesiastical superstition mankind might in gen- 
eral be supposed to consider it; go mad over it.” 

Smith shuddered. He hoped they weren’t going 
to talk about that. h“Did you read that story in 
the Christmas number of Black's Monthly, Mrs. 
Moore?” he asked. 

No, Mabel had not read it, sad to confess; 
whereupon Smith began telling the plot in detail: 
A young man, out of work, sits in kitchen, face 
buried in his hands; in the parlour his wife lies dead; 
out on the back porch a couple of half-starved chil- 
dren of his seek amusement. Disgusted with this 
unendurable state of things, in desperation, unable 
to pay his rent, the young man resolves. to see his 
landlord, who is a millionaire living up the Hudson. 
But on getting there he is ordered oft the premises 
as a tramp. Going towards the river, he oppor- 
tunely rescues the millionairess little girl from 
drowning, and at the imminent risk of his own 
life; whilst the next moment he is picked up by 
the millionaire, who chances to be passing in his 
palatial yacht. 

Smith recited it in full, affirming it to be one of 
the best short stories of the season. 

“In short,” said Sam, “Oliver has a genuine love 
for the millionaire in the guise of the fairy god- 
mother.” 

“Stuff! what idiotic trash!” cried Nannette, who 
had listened rhapsodically, “why, it is even worse 
than Cinderella! Surely you are not in earnest, 
Mr. Goldsmith-Smith?” 

The latter insisted, asseverating that there was 


150 


GOD’S REBEL . 


nothing new in literature, simply old characters in 
new clothes. “If it reminds you of Cinderella, Miss 
Nielsen, it merely proves its genuineness, its uni- 
versality.” 

An argument resulted immediately, with some 
heat, tempered anon with laughter as they reached 
some reductio ad absurdum; wherein the professor 
took no part, merely listening, pensively, wonder- 
ing how long Goldsmith-Smith and the balance of 
the world would continue to take delight in sucn 
literature; how long we, who presumptuously style 
ourselves the educated classes, should continue to 
laugh at children and servant girls for finding 
pleasure in a form of literature that is at least no 
more flagrant and intolerable than our own society 
novel and magazine refuse.* 

In the midst of it all the door-bell rang, and Dr. 
and Mrs. Holden entered. “Good! You are just 
in time, doctor,” Kenneth cried; “we are in dispute 
over the most venerable character in fiction, the 
strongest passion that shadows humanity — the fairy 
god-mother and her disguises.” 

“Superstition — is that what you mean?” 

Oliver objected, strenuously, but at length con- 
ceded the point. “Well, you may call it supersti- 
tion, if you like. What I maintain is that it pays 
best, is most universal, surest to catch the general 
public, whether one be author, publisher ” 

“Or preacher,” his host interposed. 

Smith staggered. “Of course; preacher, or — or 
anybody else!” 

The laugh that followed proved, so far as pay was 
concerned, that Oliver had silenced all opponents. 

*“My own opinion has long been, that for New World 
service our ideas of beauty — inherited from the Greeks, and 
so on to Shakespeare — need to be radically changed, and 
made anew for to-day’s purposes and finer standards.” — 
Whitman. 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


I5i 

“Superstition always pays best,” Holden agreed; 
“it is deep-rooted, older even than humanity.” 

Mabel rose. “Won’t you come and play some- 
thing, Kenneth?” she asked. 

“Oh, after awhile. Please let us smoke and talk 
for a minute. Ask Nannette to play for you.” 

And, uninterrupted by the sounds from the ad- 
joining room, the men continued to sit there, fol- 
lowing up the subject of superstition, conserva- 
tism, and their biologic foundation; the difficulty 
of throwing off an old habit of thought. Even in 
the world of inanimate things one beholds the same 
story; for example, we take a piece of polished 
steel, place a wafer on it, now breathe on it and 
throw the wafer aside. Then put the steel away 
for a day or a year, breathe on it, and lo! the 
spectral image of the wafer returns again and again 
with every breath. 

Even so the impression of the individual becomes 
that of the race, the nation. With every change in 
the wind this spectral image appears, warning us, 
haunting us, commanding us after it is dead. We 
call it superstition. 

Alas! when should we get rid of the thing; when 
should the damned spot be wiped out? How long 
would the pestiferous Past continue to snap at our 
heels and feudal fools cry out “Backward! back- 
ward!” when we would go forward? When would 
the Law of the Present come to be considered as 
holy, as worshipful, and as beautiful, as our super- 
stition? 

When? 

Perchance when Friday falls on Monday; when 
thirteen tolls no more than ten; when ghosts agree 
to sleep at night and walk at noon! 

“I presume you have noticed, professor,” Kent 
remarked, “that my old firm, McBugle & Dunn, 


152 


GOD'S REBEL . 


have just brought out a new college text-book on 
economics. Have you seen it?” 

Kenneth sighed. “What a pity! The world 
would be infinitely better off if nothing had ever 
been written on that subject, especially to-day when 
all our college text-books, impelled by the malevo- 
lent force behind them, are trying to inculcate prin- 
ciples so false that the veriest tyro can prick them 
full of holes. For instance, there’s my colleague, 
Professor Lawrence. You know he has recently 
written that the sole object of labour to-day is for 
the sake of the saving of capital. Surely, here is 
the truth with a vengeance! The great mass of 
people suppose that the object of labour is to gain 
a subsistence. This, manifestly, was God’s inten- 
tion; but behold how the capitalists and Professor 
Lawrence have turned the tables on the Deity!” 

Sam smiled, puffing a cloudy halo about his face. 
“I made a mistake last Sunday,” he confessed, 
“and went to church — the richest church in this 
city, too. It was very interesting; the preacher 
began by stating that one of the most unanswer- 
able proofs of the blessings of Christianity was con- 
tained in our great and glorious banking-system. 
Most of his listeners were bankers, I inferred. ‘Two 
thousand years ago,’ said he, ‘when a man wanted 
to take care of his money he dug a hole and buried 
it in the ground; but to-day Christianity has given 
the people confidence, so that we can now trust 
our money to one another, with interest.’ Ha, ha! 
Pretty rich, wasn’t it?” 

“Yes, it certainly beats the devil,” said Holden, 
joining in the laugh; “the nerve that some of those 
preachers show to-day. Why, I doubt if one out of 
a hundred ever heard the tale of Christ’s driving the 
money-lenders out of the temple. However, it must 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


1 53 

be very comforting for our bankers to have such a 
convenient preacher in their employ.” 

“Tut! Don’t blame the hired-man. Poor devil! 
he must speak as he is bidden — in the direction of 
his bread and butter.” 

“Oh, of course. Still, it is none the pleasanter 
for that.” 

Silence followed, only broken by the rustling of 
the paper as Kent turned the pages of a magazine 
lying on the desk at his side. 

“Is everything quiet at Wheeling, doctor?” 
asked Kenneth quietly. 

Holden nodded. “On the surface, at least. The 
car company still refuses to reduce its rents or water 
rates.” 

“And the reduction of wages continues?” 

“Yes; I don’t see how they live, most of them. 
I know they are utterly unable to pay for medical 
service.” 

“Um! Should think Mr. Wheeling would be 
coming home soon and try to settle matters. Don’t 
suppose you’ve heard, have you?” 

“No; he’s still travelling in Europe,” the doc- 
tor answered; “however, for the peace of my own 
family, if nothing else, I wish he’d hurry up. Mr. 
Dana now has full charge, you know; he is down 
to Wheeling every day; sometimes he comes to 
our house for lunch, but generally he refuses. He 
thinks I’m an anarchist confirmed; everyone is an 
anarchist who combats his selfish interests. But it 
distresses Julia.” 

Kent glanced up from his magazine. “Have you 
read this?” he asked, indicating the article. “It’s 
entitled ‘The Causes of Poverty.’ ” 

The professor nodded. “Oh, yes; that’s another 
of those comfortable sugar-coated pills for the 


154 


GOD'S REBEL. 


wealthy to swallow. I swear, Mr. Kent, I formerly 
felt that when a man wrote in that style it was , be- 
cause he was ignorant and therefore not responsi- 
ble; but now I believe such authors are mostly 
knaves or downright hirelings.” 

Kent looked for the author’s name. “Yes, I 
thought I knew his style,” he admitted. 

“Of course, there’s nothing new in it. You saw 
he began by making sport of Cardinal Gibbons’ 
idea that we must always have poverty because of 
the alleged declaration by Christ, The poor ye have 
always with you;’ and hence these great social in- 
equalities, which were designed by God in order 
that the rich might learn to cultivate those higher 
qualities of charity and benevolence. The author 
confesses, however, that this view of the cardinal’s 
seems rather superficial to him, accordingly we 
should infer a somewhat profounder grasp of the 
subject on his part. But no, quite the contrary; 
after a very pessimistic strain of a page or two, he 
sums up, I remember, by giving us the following 
causes of poverty: ist. Because it is written in the 
Scriptures that God cursed the earth and bade it 
be unfruitful. 2d. Machinery (the inventive faculty 
of man is a curse!). 3d. The great social and in- 
dustrial law, made sacred by Scripture, that unto 
every one that hath shall be given, whilst from him 
who hath nothing even that little which he hath 
shall be taken. 4th. Improvidence, ignorance, 
drunkenness. There you have it all in a nutshell. 
Is it not outrageous that any reputable maga- 
zine should print such rot in this age! They have 
the cheek to call us reformers pessimists; but these 
fools who resort to the Scriptures and tell us at 
every turn that we and the whole world are cursed 
— why, they are optimists! They own their maga- 
zines and newspapers and churches by the thou- 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


155 


sand, and if tyranny and oppression ever need an 
excuse for themselves all they have to do is to 
point to the Scriptures. That settles it!” 

He had forgotten his satire for the moment, and 
spoke with warmth and earnestness. The almost 
daily appearance of knavish and flimsy excuses for 
poverty, based on the Bible, such as were advanced 
in our leading magazines and papers was begin- 
ning to sting him. He could see no longer any rea- 
son for a man of average intelligence being unable 
to understand a simple proposition in economics 
such as children of twelve were able to solve; no 
reason but one, at least — and that the worst. So 
long as all industry was conducted for the sake of 
interest and profits, just so long, he maintained, 
would the helpless and innocent producers con- 
tinue to be robbed, fleeced, for the benefit of the 
few. To be told in this age and generation that 
God had cursed the earth, and to allege it as an 
excuse for famine and starvation in Ireland or 
India with the well-known facts of English land- 
lordism in full view, or in this monopoly-ridden 
land of ours, was enough to make a man’s blood 
boil. Quite as much, even, as to be told by a 
Roman Catholic cardinal that we must continue 
to have poor people in order to stimulate the benev- 
olent faculties of the rich! 

“Someone,” observed Kent, “ought to send the 
cardinal a marked copy of Jerome’s comical little 
story of Lady Bountiful. That good lady, you re- 
member, was very desirous of renting a home in 
a certain suburb of London, but found to her in- 
finite dismay that there were no poor people there. 
The renting agent, however, agreed to fix that all 
right, and accordingly imported several poor fam- 
ilies to fill her order. But the next difficulty was 
that the town had no regular drunkard. Dear 


GOD’S REBEL . 


156 

Lady Bountiful could never stand that; so a man 
was finally hired to come and live there, who agreed 
to get drunk at least three times a week. He made 
a great fuss over it at first, poor devil! but with a 
fine regard to his duty in stimulating the benevo- 
lent habits of the community he stuck to it heroic- 
ally — some even swore that the old fellow actually 
enjoyed it after awhile. Oh, yes ” 

But the laugh interrupted him; the tale was apt, 
and curiously fresh to the others, suggestive of in- 
numerable mirth-compelling situations. 

“God knows,” said Kenneth, “what our unfor- 
tunate rich people would do if it weren’t for the 
drunkards and paupers to stimulate them!” 

“For my part,” Kent continued, “I long ago 
made up my mind that organised Christianity and 
Democracy are absolutely incompatible—dead 
arms around a vital being’s neck. Every law of 
growth and development is in direct opposition 
to any institutional thing like the church; we be- 
hold the proof of it in noting that wherever the 
human race has made an advance it has had first 
to get rid of some stupid tenet of alleged Chris- 
tianity. Oh, yes; it is all right for a monarchy; 
part and parcel of it, in fact. But for a republic 
such as ours, I believe it to be the most dangerous 
and blinding superstition that threatens our prog- 
ress.”^ 

The room was growing dark as Holden rose to 
take his leave. “No, no, Henry,” Kenneth pro- 
tested, “you are all to stay to dinner. It’s not often 
we — Hello!” 

A burst of music sounded in from the street, the 
whistle of flute or piccolo. 

“Oh, professor,” a voice called, breathless, from 
the adjoining room, “it’s that same old fellow, you 
know. Can’t we ask him in?” 


A WINTER AFTERNOON 


157 


“Oh, no, I shouldn’t, Nannette,” Mabel ob- 
jected; “you never can tell where they come from.” 

“Nonsense! what do we care about that!” her 
husband retorted. “Go on, Nannette; fetch him 
in.” And peering through the window, he added: 
“Ah, I have seen him before.” It was the same old 
fellow he had heard fiddling the Marseillaise on 
that memorable excursion with the Reverend Mr. 
Griggs. 

“It’s old Pedro — Spanish Pete, they call him. 
Everyone knows him,” Smith explained. “The 
last time I saw him, though, was in the police court 
— arrested for being a receiver of stolen goods.” 

“Dear me, Kenneth,” began Mabel, “you 
see •” 

“Hush!” 

An old man, patched, white-locked and whis- 
kered, and not overclean, stood in the doorway, 
fife and hat in either hand, and though plainly dis- 
turbed by this irregular departure from all the 
rules and conventions of his craft, yet was he not 
too embarrassed to greet his waiting audience with 
a bow that was oddly pathetic in its unexpected 
grace and courtly elegance. Kenneth hastened to 
offer him a chair. But no, the old man knew his 
part: had been invited for the sole sake of playing. 
Well, he would teach them something they had 
never dreamt of or imagined — that music did not 
dwell in conventional parlours, mounted upon ma- 
hogany stools and upholstered chairs; neither con- 
tained in the instrument, but within the performer. 

Merely a cheap tin fife for his instrument, such as 
sells everywhere for a nickel. He placed the 
mouth-piece between his lips, and after a soft but 
wailing prelude like the wind in winter branches, 
struck boldly and shrilly into an Hungarian dance 
movement in E flat. His audience gazed at one 


GOD’S REBEL . 


158 

another in mute surprise; they had waited good- 
naturedly, expecting to hear some impossible vari- 
ations on more or less popular airs of the day. On 
the contrary, the skill of the performer held them 
spellbound from the very first note; for not only 
did he produce with artistic assurance all the usual 
tones and half-tones, but also those infinite lesser 
gradations and sonorous shifts which one is accus- 
tomed to hear only in the musical mystery of 
strings. 

A sudden ring at the door-bell failed to interrupt, 
passing unheeded', save by Mabel, who answered it. 

“Why, it’s Doctor Little !” she exclaimed, with 
a little cry of dismay as she started back. “Y — yes, 
my husband is home.” 

“Thank you; IT1 trouble him just a — ” He 
stepped in. “Ah, you are holding a soiree; you 
didn’t tell me.” Glancing swiftly into' the parlour 
his eyes grew big with astonishment, then twinkled 
mischievously. 

“Certainly, a most democratic gathering,” he af- 
firmed, with amusement. 

The dance had ceased; instantly some one 
suggested the ballet music from Mendelssohn’s 
Midsummer Night’s Dream, the professor accom- 
panying him at the piano. It was irresistible; the 
whistling laughter and sparkle had created a 
mimic stage. Even the good Dr. Little was tripped 
off his feet and into the sitting-room, diddle-diddle- 
de-diddle-de-diddle-de, to the tune of that vivacious 
quickstep that has since found its curious renaissance 
in the motif of “Johnny Get Your Gun.” The inter- 
mezzo fetched an encore, and again; whilst Nan- 
nette solicited contributions in Smith’s silk hat and 
at the close presented piper with hat and contents. 

“Gracias, senorita” he bowed, and was for leav- 
ing, when Kenneth struck up a college song. At 


A WINTER AFTERNOON. 


159 


once the old man improvised a rippling obligato, 
the while all voices joined in and Lauriger Horatius 
echoed through the house. Amid the cheers and 
applause at the close, the piper dodged through the 
door and was gone, heedless, perhaps, of the “Come 
again!” that followed him. 

Dr. Little wiped his glasses and cleared his voice. 
“Yes, I declare, professor, you are surely on the 
right track. O dear me, yes! If we could only 
bring the classes together; wipe out this absurd 
upper-class rule and intolerance, and instil some- 
what more of the spirit of liberty, equality, frater- 
nity. Aye, therein lies the way — and the hope — of 
humanity. Now that old man, how much he showed 
us in his music, of that other life, its joys and 
shadows, of which we know next to nothing. His 
must be a very fine character, I should say.” 

So he chatted awhile, and in vein the freest; Ken- 
neth had seldom seen him so open. “The joy of life!” 
he remarked to him in a word aside, his hand on 
the young man’s shoulder. “I see, even your home 
breathes a different atmosphere. Ah, no wonder 
your students find your lectures fresh and original 
— bursting with life. However, I must be going; 
I shall surely miss my train. Good-by; good-by!” 
And to Mabel “You must really send me an in- 
vitation another time, Mrs. Moore.” 

At dinner, some one spoke of the president’s 
manner — his cordiality, sympathetic tolerance. 
Many were surprised, having heard of him other- 
wise; but as for Kenneth, he merely remembered, 
vaguely, that Dr. Little was a Christian of the old 
type, but trusted that he might prove honest, after 
all. 


i6o 


GOD'S REBEL . 


CHAPTER XIV. 

ALL A FORGERY. 

It was one of those late mornings in mid- Janu- 
ary; Potiphar’s wife sat at breakfast alone with 
her mother; her husband of the sun-glorious name 
had not yet risen; had, in fact, attended a banquet 
the night before, where, as she read in the morn- 
ing’s paper, “his words, fraught with the profound- 
est philosophy, were drunk with every testimonial 
of approval by the host of practical, influential gen- 
tlemen who heard him.” Something else besides 
words were drunk, possibly — practical and influ- 
ential gentlemen do sometimes have a taste for 
other than liquid syllables or profound philosophy. 
At any rate, Potiphar was late to breakfast. In 
sooth, he frequently confessed at this hour to an in- 
compatibility in his name, to its inappropriateness; 
this man who, we are informed in Holy Writ, was “a 
captain in the king’s guard,” but whose father nev- 
ertheless had been only a peregrinating Methodist 
preacher down in Ohio who made a specialty of 
hell and confessed to the fathership of twelve lusty 
children; Potiphar being the eldest and born at 
sunrise, whence the name. 

“I understand the Republican has got a new 
editor,” Mrs. Anthony remarked. “I read an ac- 
count of him in last night’s paper.” 

“Yes. Contemptible, wasn’t it?” Enid answered, 
without looking up. 

“Who — the new editor?” 

“Of course. Didn’t you read what he said in 
that interview?” The new editor, it appeared, was 
a man who had hitherto posed as a reformer, who 


ALL A FORGERY. 


161 


had for years been fighting against those innum- 
erable plutocratic schemes advocated and initiated 
by the Republican. He had been working on an 
obscure New York paper. In the interview in 
question he had stated, frankly, that when the 
Republican offered him a better salary he just 
dropped his principles, seized his grip and came 
on; that a man’s first duty belonged to the em- 
ployer who would pay him the most. 

“And you call that contemptible, Enid?” 

“Certainly, mamma; don’t you?” 

Mrs. Anthony didn’t know; she seemed vaguely 
to remember some statement in the Bible that 
sanctioned that sort of thing, the servant’s posi- 
tion in respect to his master. Being a virtuous 
woman, however, and not accustomed to hunting 
excuses for sin, her knowledge of the Bible was 
not of the freshest, hence she refrained from 
quoting the passage. Still, she knew it was there; 
sometime she would look for it. Enid had such an 
uncompromising way of speaking at times of these 
shifts and changes that all men must make, now 
and then, in order to better themselves. 

“No,” said she; “I don’t think it was contempti- 
ble, exactly. Men must do these things, Enid, in 
order to get on.” 

“Yes, mamma, I am familiar with the excuse.” 

There was just a trace of sarcasm in her reply, 
exciting her mother to wonder, uneasily, whether 
she had ever come to a clandestine understanding 
of the way by which her husband Potiphar had 
“got on.” She hoped not; Enid might not like it; 
girls were so foolish! Potiphar had begun his 
career in the oil regions in Ohio; a struggling 
young lawyer a dozen years ago, with scarcely 
means to pay his office rent. At that time there 
was a great wave of “popular discontent” over the 

ii 


GOD'S REBEL . 


162 

doings of the Saviour Oil Co., which had a way 
of blowing-up and otherwise crushing its rivals 
in order to mitigate the evils of competition in 
oil. Potiphar Phillips had familiarised himself 
thoroughly with the methods of the Saviour Co.; 
succeeded in securing no end of testimony against 
them, which he brought out on the preliminary 
trial. The following day he threw up the case, and 
was made attorney for the oil company with head- 
quarters in Chicago. Thence he rose rapidly with 
“the light of the world.” His name w r as fateful, 
perhaps, after all. 

All of which Mrs. Anthony knew, but wisely said 
nothing. 

Howbeit Potiphar did not limit his practice to 
the interests of the Saviour Oil Co. ; once on a time 
he had served as city attorney, and thereafter had 
been much the vogue as a criminal lawyer. Men 
of his talent, we find, are generally very resource- 
ful; in fact, in all his career he had made but one 
out-and-out blunder, which happened in this wise. 
It was a case of murder. All murderers, it may 
be conceded, are rather slippery fellows, and this 
one especially ; being charged, indeed, with making 
soap of his wife. One should not blame an at- 
torney for slipping, in an instance of this sort, per- 
haps. Nor was there the slightest doubt of the 
man’s guilt ; yet when Potiphar took the case every 
one felt assured that the fellow would be ac- 
quitted. This was what Potiphar was employed 
for; law being not a question of justice, but of 
competition between lawyers. Justice has small 
chance with a dull lawyer, crime has much with a 
bright one — as criminals generally know. 

Consequently Potiphar’s final plea in this trial, 
though startling, was none the less convincing. 
“Your honour, gentlemen of the intelligent jury, 


ALL A FORGERY. 163 

ladies and gentlemen/’ said he suavely after the 
prisoner’s guilt had been fully established. “I wish 
to call your attention to a crucial point in this 
case hitherto overlooked. After profoundest re- 
search, investigation, and inquiry, I have discov- 
ered the fact that this prisoner is a twin whose 
brother died a natural death several years ago. Now 
I therefore take occasion to warn you that nowhere, 
in all the history of the world, has a twin ever been 
hanged, or suffered from false accusation, whose 
brother has died a natural death. Aye,” he 
pounded the jury-rail fiercely with his fist, “I defy 
anyone in all this world to cite me one single in- 
stance to establish such a precedent!” 

The effect was electrical; no one being able to 
establish such a precedent when challenged, for 
several days thereafter the criminal’s life hung in 
the balance, with the chances in favour of his going 
scot-free. But now when the case had reached 
this stage, and all knew that nothing short of a 
miracle would make it possible for the State to 
convict, a strange thing happened; one of those 
satirical tricks of Mammon that may even go so 
far as to hang a man for murder or leave him an 
ornament to the luxurious society of the nine- 
teenth century. For, as we have shown, it takes 
money to prove a man’s innocence in these days, 
and, obviously, the more money the more inno- 
cence. 

In need of funds, therefore, to meet a payment 
on a certain desirable piece of real-estate, Potiphar 
had taken a note to his banker for discounting, 
which had been given him as a fee by the mur- 
derer and purported to be endorsed by one of the 
murderer’s friends, a man of property. The note 
called for ten thousand dollars. At the bank, turn- 
ing the note over in his hands and studying the 


164 


GOD’S REBEL. 


endorsement critically, the usurious gentleman 
within the gilt cage sniffed doubtfully — 

“Have you — er — ever spoken to the endorser 
about this, Mr. Phillips?” 

Potiphar shook his head, squarely. “No — what’s 
the use! He’s good for it, ain’t he?” 

“Oh, assuredly,” purred the banker, blandly; “he’s 
good — if he agrees to it. This isn’t his signature. 
It’s a forgery.” 

“A forgery? Good heavens!” And he had even 
advanced the murderer four thousand on it, where- 
with to buy dainties and entertain his friends in 
his cell! Oh, it was awful! He had never even 
imagined anything like that. Out of the bank and 
into the basement beneath he stumbled, seeking a 
balm in Gilead. The bar-tender handed him bottle 
and glass, which he filled to the brim; his trem- 
bling hand arousing the young man’s sympathetic 
curiosity. “How is the case going, Mr. Phillips?” 
he asked. Mr. Phillips filled up his glass, twice, 
thrice; gazed at his questioner with blank, in- 
scrutable eyes, whispering solemnly. “Sh! old 
man; it’s all a forgery!” 

Thence to the street, unsteadily, where he met 
a pair of convivials, who, seeing that he was labour- 
ing under great mental stress, generously took his 
arm and helped him along. In another of those 
gilded retreats he was asked, after the glasses were 
emptied, whether the rumour was true that he was 
going to support the prohibition ticket that spring? 
Usually Potiphar was witty when in his cups, as 
everyone knew, but now he could only reply, sadly, 
as he shook his head, his accents fraught with the 
profoundest philosophy — 

“Sh! old man; ish all a forzhra!” 

When he reached his office, his clerk sent word 
home to his wife that Potiphar was out of town; 


ALL A FORGERY. 165 

would probably be absent for a week; called sud- 
denly. Late in the day came Mr. James Dana to 
consult with him about pending troubles at the 
Wheeling Car Works and the advisability of re- 
ducing wages. Whereto Potiphar, fetching his 
fist down on his desk vigorously: “Thash ri, old 
man; ish all a forzhra!” causing the millionaire to 
jump at this sudden and unexpected truthful thrust. 
And following him came President Little, of Rock- 
land University, to speak with him privately about 
this troublesome spirit of discontent on the part of 
the public. “They are demanding municipal own- 
ership of the gas-works now owned by Mr. Rock- 
land,” protested the good doctor. Mr. Rockland, 
who owned the Saviour Oil Co., for which Poti- 
phar was the attorney! “It is all the work of Pro- 
fessor Moore,” the doctor avowed in disgust. “That 
man will have to be silenced, sir!” 

Rising on legs that rebelled, Potiphar tottered 
towards him, seized him by his lapels. “Sh! don’ 
shay a word, old man!” he admonished mysteri- 
ously. “Ish all a forzhra!” 

At his window, high up in the great office 
building, he stood gazing out on the city; the 
great department stores; the towering granite bee- 
hives where dwelt the ignoble, miscellaneous swarm 
of agents who produced nothing and subsisted on 
legitimate fleecings; the splendid banks where 
money was so cheap and the poor bankers com- 
plained at their inability to loan ; and the pygmy hu- 
manity rushing in and out, in and out. All was a 
strange jangle, disharmony; the crazy, incessant 
cries of people out in the hall sounded in through his 
transom : “Going up ! Going down !” with the hideous 
jar and rattle of iron doors swinging open and shut. 
Potiphar saw it all; heard it all. The scene swam 


1 66 


GOD’S REBEL. 


before him. Raising the sash suddenly and leaning 
far out, he shouted, passionately, impulsively — 

“Stop! Stop! Ish all a forzhra, I shay!” 

His clerks heard him and pulled him in out of 
danger. It was the first time they had ever heard 
Potiphar tell the plain unvarnished truth about 
things; when he had actually been able to judge the 
industrial world aright, once — and that, 0 temporal 
0 mores! only because he was drunk. 

Naturally, Enid’s husband had little sympathy 
or tolerance for the ideas advocated b)> Professor 
Kenneth Moore. “Why, if his theories should pre- 
vail, Enid, his notion of public ownership of all 
public utilities, society would be overthrown; at 
least the society that supports me and some other 
men. Then what should we do?” 

She appeared not alarmed. “Do you think we 
should starve, Potiphar?” 

“Humph! Well, no; we shouldn’t starve, ex- 
actly, but it would tend to kill all aspiration — de- 
stroy all that’s best in a man.” 

She was silent; it may have been this too visible 
posing before her of “all that’s best in a man.” 

“I expect to be downtown about noon,” she 
remarked. “Shall we lunch together?” 

Potiphar plead excuses, with genuine regret. He 
was sorry, but expected to lunch with a party of 
business men. “Remember, Enid,” he called back 
at the door, “I have tickets to-night for the opera. 
Good-by.” 

It was still too early for her to start downtown, 
and she turned to her music. For a space she 
wandered vaguely through a wilderness of sounds; 
a stray note of winsome sweetness here, the mel- 
ancholy flutter of wings overhead for a moment, 
and then again the silence, the silence. The rip- 
ple of the accompaniment murmured monotonous- 


ALL A FORGERY. 


167 

ly like the fret of falling- water, and there was not 
a human soul in sight. Music, that mirroring 
stream wherein one gazes, Narcissus-like, merely to 
find the reflection of one’s own face — nothing else, 
she felt. 

It w&s not satisfying. She rose. “Mamma, 
don’t you want to go with me? A little drive will 
do you good.” 

“Mercy no, dear !” she declared, her paper rustling 
with decision. “It would give me a frightful head- 
ache to drive at this hour.” 

For some reason, as she stepped into the car- 
riage she directed the coachman to drive out past 
the Rockland University, thence by the boulevard 
into the city. It is out of the way, but will be a 
change, she partly explained to herself, settling 
back in the cushions. Moreover, she had never 
seen those magnificent buildings, situated in the 
full stare of the boulevard midst the homes of the 
wealthy and fashionable in order, perhaps, that 
such might feel properly thrilled with pride on be- 
holding at once this pedestal and monument of 
their extensive fortunes, that they might approxi- 
mate, even, the grateful feelings of Constantine, 
when, beholding the dangerous growth of Chris- 
tianity, he remarked to his wife, sub rosa: “It is a 
good thing, my dear; I propose to take it in.” 

It was a gray day; the ground was bare and 
frozen, snow falling in a slanting, desultory 
fashion as they neared the quadrangle. Aye, the 
buildings were proud, massive, defiant; yet was 
there somewhat absent, one scarcely could define 
it; lack of colour, warmth, life, causing each par- 
ticular facade to frown at one, ominously. No 
classic elms nor stately oaks served to veil this alma 
mater, through whose boughs, be it spring or dead 
of winter, the whispering voice as of a nun at prayer 


1 68 


GOD’S REBEL . 


should breathe eternally: “Esto perpetua; esto 
perpetua.” On the contrary, everything bore the 
stamp and blazonry of that modern brigand, the 
captain of industry. 

Enid saw no one, save one solitary student 
who ran across the quadrangle, his coat collar 
turned up, a book under each arm. What would 
happen to a man, she wondered, if the weight of 
all those buildings and the force behind them 
should chance to fall upon him? And had Ken- 
neth never thought of that? 

As her carriage crossed the street-car tracks 
she saw some one waiting on the farther corner. 
It was Professor Thurston; she stopped and beck- 
oned to him. 

“You are going downtown ?” he asked. 

She made way on the seat for him. “What an 
awfully dreary spot!” she exclaimed. “You see, 
Eve been visiting your university. Of course I 
saw only the outside ; shouldn’t dare to go in. Do 
your students have military discipline; and have 
you any cannon?” 

The professor smiled. “Yes,” he sighed, step- 
ping in; “we have military discipline, and expect 
to have cannon before long. Anything that’s new 
and startling, wholly outrageous, will probably be 
a good plan in this city.” 

“You don’t like us, I fear?” 

“Frankly, no,” he returned; “everything is so 
horribly new. There’s no rest for the eye or the 
soul anywhere.” 

He spoke with a courteous, mildly deprecatory 
drawl; being a professor of Latin, everything new 
was the object of his scholarly detestation. “Your 
lake, even ” he began again. 

“Thank you; you are very generous.” 

“No, you are quite welcome, I assure you. Your 


ALL A FORGERY. 


169 

lake, even, the shores of your lake, might be made 
so beautiful, so restful ; but instead of that your rich 
people stick up outrageous monuments of various 
kinds along its shores as though continually to re- 
mind the traveller, entering the city for the first 
time, of this arrogant, immodest newness. I sup- 
pose you’ve seen the new bronze group of Indians 
holding a scalping reception, commemorative of 
some historic event of only fifty years ago, that 
Mr. Wheeling has just unveiled in front of his resi- 
dence. I declare, it’s beastly; I always feel like 
calling the patrol to carry off the remains.” 

Enid laughed. She did not try, however, to de- 
fend that particular work of art against the pro- 
fessor’s criticism. 

“I’ve only found one person,” he drawled, “who 
really enjoys that monument, laughs whenever he 
passes it. And that is Professor Moore.” 

“Indeed?” Her voice showed interest scarcely 
merited. 

“Yes; Moore insists that those Indians are 
wholly beautiful and appropriate, in that particular 
spot; claims it is a symbol of evolution, as now- 
adays it is Mr. Wheeling who is scalping the peo- 
ple, instead of those Indians; says it always re- 
minds him of that fine old Presbyterian hymn, 
‘Here I’ll raise my Ebenezer.’ ” 

The carriage turned through the park, down the 
broad, winding drives sweeping round the lagoons 
that were now frozen, where parties of school chil- 
dren skated, shouted and enjoyed themselves to the 
full, just as though everything had not been so 
“horribly new.” The trees had already grown into 
a beautiful forest, pleasing to penetrate even in 
mid-winter; winding walks, rising banks and slop- 
ing-valleys, frozen beds where flowers and flower- 
ing shrubs had been, haunts of June in January. 


GOD’S REBEL. 


170 

The professor continued his drawl. But she Knew 
his habit; knew he was fain to humour himself by 
walking backward through life, in consequence of 
which he was eternally hitting his back against 
some obstacle, generally something new. One of 
that strange yet helpless type sometimes known 
as conservative, whose heads the Infinite jester has 
seen fit to set upon shoulders in a position opposite 
to normal, then giving them the command, 
“March!” continually towards the West, with faces 
fixed religiously upon the Eternal East. Chains 
rattled when they moved, and the snows of Siberia 
were in their lingering steps. 

Enid often felt like asking him if his feet didn’t 
get cold. 

“I read your magazine article,” she said quietly, 
“in this month’s American.” 

His eyes brightened. “Ah, did you like it? No? 
Oh, well; I knew you wouldn’t; very few people are 
capable of liking truth.” 

The article in question had been merely a Latin 
teacher’s tirade and disapproval of popular educa- 
tion — of the education of the masses beyond the 
merest rudiments; he had deplored the fact that 
the perfume of the Attic violet was being driven 
out from the American university by the stench of 
the chemist’s crucible. That was all. She did not 
agree. 

“I only know, Mrs. Phillips, that truth is beauty, 
and that this thing we see, this widespread clamour 
for so-called equality of opportunity, is the reverse 
of beautiful. Hence I prefer to shun it.” 

She did not pursue it. That truth meant growth, 
therefore life, and not an idol in the East, was a 
fact to be learned by experience. If this failed to 
instruct, convince, then nothing would. The In- 
finite must have his little joke out, and if the 


ALL A FORGERY. 


171 

professor’s feet really did get cold he could don 
his overshoes. 

Downtown, where the boulevard approached the 
lake, their carriage was brought to a halt by a great 
crowd gathered round a cleared space in the center 
of which a balloon was filling;* its fandus already 
high in the air, flaunting to the eyes of everyone 
the banner which bore the name of the firm that 
chose this method of advertising its industrial su- 
premacy — 

MOSES, JONES & CO., THE SUPREME! 

“Dear me! we are blocked. Would you mind 
walking?” 

“Oh, no,” Thurston complied, helping ner out 
with alacrity; “certainly not, if it will help us to 
avoid this beastly balloon ascension.” They pushed 
their way on through the crowd. “Wait!” he ex- 
claimed suddenly, stopping short. “There is 
Moore now — do> you see him? Ah, you might 
know he would be here. How the fellow seems 
to fancy it, too!” 

As they paused, a young girl approached, making 
her way through the midst till she reached the 
center. She was enveloped in a long cloak, but- 
toned only at the neck, which fell away and re- 
vealed the slight but perfectly moulded form of the 
athlete, clad in tights. The trapeze bar dangling 
from the balloon was barely touching the ground. 

Kenneth stood there, absorbed in the drama; the 
musing, half satirical expression of his giving place 
to a flush of indignation as he beheld the young 
girl. Enid and Thurston approached behind him; 
she touched him on the arm. 

He started. “Enid? Ah, how are you, Thurs- 
ton? So you’ve come to see the great sacrifice sale 
initiated, too. Well, it’s a bargain. Have you 


IJ2 


GOD'S REBEL. 


seen the girl? Moses, jones & Co. are about 
to rear their altar high in the air. Behold the 
victim !” 

The air was quiet overhead, the sky clear and 
blue, and the temperature scarce to be called cold; 
yet a bonfire of dry-goods boxes blazed within the 
circle, towards which the “victim” spread her 
hands. One saw that she shivered slightly. 

Enid clutched his arm. “Good heavens! They 
won’t let that child go up a day like this, will they?” 

“Surely,” he answered. “Don’t you see it’s a 
large crowd, and a fairly quiet day? They can’t 
afford to miss this opportunity of advertising, you 
know; especially when it is claimed that the aver- 
age person hasn’t intelligence enough to purchase 
goods without this sort of thing to advise him.” 

She made no answer; it frightened her. She 
looked out over the lake. 

Professor Thurston looked bored — and stamped 
his feet! 

Columbus, from the height of his pedestal on the 
lake front, turned his benign glance over the scene. 
Four hundred years ago he had landed on Ameri- 
can shores, encountered savages; but such were 
tame, gentle, civilised, compared to these be-furred 
and be-frocked and be-damned individuals who 
stood round with their hands in pockets, calmly, 
listlessly observant of the helpless girl. 

“But why does she do it, Kenneth?” Enid cried. 
“Why can’t she do something else?” And unable 
to conceal her alarm she added, compassionately: 
“Can’t you stop it, somehow?” 

She saw his face twitch as he answered, endea- 
vouring to preserve indifference. “Tut, we mustn’t 
get excited over these little things, you know. 
Don’t you recollect what the Mikado said to Koko? 
‘My dear fellow, tomorrow you are to be boiled in 


ALL A FORGERY. 


173 


oil. Yes, it’s very sad, I know; I will admit that 
it’s even a bad law, and shall have it changed at the 
next session of the legislature. But of course that 
won’t do you any good. Koko, farewell !’ ” 

“Oh, don’t,” she protested, amazed at his heart- 
lessness. “Let us go on.” 

“No, stay! I’ll answer you, if you insist. Well, 
she does it because she is honest, and can make 
an honest living no other way. Poor thing ! She’s 
yet to learn that honesty is her misfortune — she’s 
quite pretty, you see. This is only one of the mil- 
lion of instances which a fraudulent society imposes 
upon the helpless, the good, and the worthy. Men 
and women, you know, seek to gratify their desires 
with the least exertion — that’s one of the first laws 
of biology and political economy. Well, then, 
when society places a premium on crime and the 
unnatural, crime and the unnatural will thrive. 
There is no such thing as a criminal; but the whole 
world sobs with the voices of hapless and guiltless 
victims. Thurston, I beg your pardon.” 

Professor Thurston smiled. “My dear fellow,” 
he drawled, “don’t mention it. I’ve heard it all 
before.” 

The trapeze was now on a level with the girl’s 
head. Throwing aside her cloak, she seized a cou- 
ple of small flags, held them between her teeth the 
while she caught the bar with her hands, then shot 
straight up like a rocket. On a level with the tallest 
buildings she had swung her feet into the angles 
where the ropes held the bar, and now hung face 
downward, waving a flag patriotically in either 
hand — “Moses, Jones & Co., The Supreme!” 
Again and again she waved them whilst the balloon 
soared swiftly upward — 


174 


GOD’S REBEL. 


“MOSES, JONES & CO., THE SUPREME!” 

A series of evolutions she performed, pretty, pic- 
turesque, pitiable, the while the balloon hung sta- 
tionary for a space, or moved slightly inland. After 
all, breathed the onlookers during a moment’s re- 
spite, it was perfectly safe; it was enterprising, 
attractive; was purely a matter of business; no oc- 
casion for false sentiment. But ah! what ailed the 
girl — why wasn’t she tending to business? A mo- 
ment ago she was holding herself straight out from 
the bar; then a sudden breeze struck the balloon, 
careening it in a manner that made one dizzy to 
see, and leaving her hanging with only one small 
hand between heaven and earth. Completely round 
and. back again she spun, still clinging tight with 
her left hand, — one saw plainly it was her left, — and 
presently catching its wrist with her right. Where- 
upon the bar tilted upward; a half inch more — a 
quarter, even, and she might have seized it, though 
all this while her body was streaming behind like 
the tail of a kite as the balloon shot out over the 
lake. 

A sigh rose up from the crowd, gathered vol- 
ume, pointed into a shriek. A woman fainted. 
Meanwhile a steam launch that had been lying in 
wait — of course it was! All accidents were pro- 
vided against by Moses, Jones and Co. — started 
after her. 

At the inquest it was claimed that her hand got 
cold, that she was careless, frightened, some 
claimed indifferent. At any rate the coroner said 
that everything was all right. 

“No, I don’t blame Moses, Jones and Co., nor the 
girl,” Kenneth repeated slowly as they made their 
way out. “It’s the system, the hellish system that 
permits, nay, that compels such things — that is 


EVOLUTION OF A GREASE-SPOT. 175 

what ought to be changed. Ah, here’s a drug- 
store. Enid, won’t you have a cup of hot choco- 
late, hot soda — anything? Thurston, my dear fel- 
low! you stamp your feet as if they were actually 
frozen !” 


CHAPTER XV. 

THE EVOLUTION OF A GREASE-SPOT. 

It was manifestly with scant regard for the 
breach constantly widening that winter between 
him and certain wealthy exploiters of labour, that 
Kenneth Moore continued his public denouncing, 
and, what was worse, his public laughter at those 
more flagrant institutions wherein their sacred cap- 
ital was invested. “Our capital,” cried one of 
these men, in an open letter to the public — “Our 
capital, against which this anarchist professor raves, 
was honestly earned, consisting entirely of wages 
saved!” Whereto the professor had merely re- 
turned, courteously: “Whose wages is it you have 
‘saved’ — your own, or your men’s?” The silence 
that followed was profound ; broken only by laugh- 
ter, and a cautious whisper from the capitalists that 
“they had treated this anarchist’s slur with the 
silence and contempt that it merited.” Doubtless 
they had, having long been famous for their silence 
and contempt! 

So far, curiously enough, aside from a little mut- 
tering, nothing had occurred to bring him into 
conflict with the financiers behind the Rockland 
University. True, he had had much to say about 
municipal gas ownership, which was in direct op- 
position to Mr. Rockland’s purse and aspirations. 
Once, only, had Dr. Little sent for him, to discuss 


GOD’S REBEL. 


1 76 

in a kindly spirit the obvious tendency of some of 
his public utterances. “I wish, Professor Moore,” 
the president had said, “that you could see your 
way to following a little more the — er — orthodox 
principles of economics as laid down by Professor 
Lawrence in his text-book. I know you don’t agree 
with him, wholly — but neither do I, for that matter. 
Still, he is at least conservative; and as it is only 
human to err, were it not best to err on the safe 
side?” 

Kenneth smiled, wondering whether the presi- 
dent had really deserted that innocent little teeter 
of his, with its eternal: “Perfectly balanced, sir! per- 
fectly balanced!” whilst it boosted now Lawrence 
into the air, and now himself. “I regret,” he had 
protested mildly, “that there are some axioms ‘laid’ 
by Professor Lawrence, some principles in his text- 
book that I could not conscientiously prescribe for 
the young, the innocent, the thoughtless; and 
so ” 

“Oh — oh — my dear fellow! Of course I 
wouldn’t have you say anything against your con- 
science, you know. Not at all! What I wish is 
that you might avoid the moot shoals, and sail well 
out where the bottom is unknown or at least purely 
speculative — ah, yes, purely speculative. And after 
all, my dear Dr. Moore, is it not rather in these 
higher and deeper questions, involving faculty of 
constructive imagination, that a scientist most truly 
serves the public?” 

The president’s face was touched with an in- 
stant’s seraphic glory; it beamed, broadened into 
a smile. He had in sooth an exceedingly joyous 
and child-like smile, which generally caused his lis- 
tener to respond, sympathetically; so that now, be- 
holding Kenneth’s face light up, without pausing 


E VOL UTION OF A GREASE-SPO T. 1 77 

to question whether it were in mischief or agree- 
ment, he went on— 

“There, there! Steer your ship well out at sea, 
professor, and for heaven’s sake keep off the rocks! 
That’s all, good-by.” 

After this manner he had been warned. 

A week or two following this he received a let- 
ter from his uncle, Edward Mason. “If conven- 
ient,” he wrote, “come out to my house to-night. 
A person whom I wish you to see will be there. He 
is an oil man; knows the history of Rockland and 
his Saviour Oil Co. from A to izzard. I think he 
may interest you.” 

Kenneth threw the letter aside. Now what do I 
care about this oil company or its history? he asked 
himself. This concerns Rockland and his univer- 
sity; obviously it is one of those “moot shoals” 
that Dr. Little would have me avoid, the while I 
occupy myself with loftier things requiring the 
“faculty of constructive imagination.” 

Mabel entered, whilst he sat there musing; she 
had just returned from downtown. “Still studying, 
Kenneth?” she asked. “You ought to go out a 
little while before dark — it’s a beautiful day.” 

She sat near him, without removing her wraps. 
“You know, I’ve found a new teacher,” she con- 
tinued. “He’s a Pole, I believe; anyway, he’s one 
of the best in the world.” 

Kenneth made no reply; then, rousing himself, 
with a start: “What’s that — a new teacher? That’s 
good!” 

“Yes, but he’s awfully expensive, you know; 
three dollars a lesson, and says that I ought to 
come three times a week.” 

“Oh, does he? Confound the fellow! That’s half 
my salary.” 

Mabel smiled pleasantly. “Yes, I know; isn’t it 
12 


GOD’S REBEL . 


178 

a nuisance to be so outrageously poor! I was going 
to ask, though, if you don’t expect a raise in your 
salary this spring?” 

He shook his head. “No; not the least chance of 
it, I’m sorry to say.” 

She removed her hat and cape, laying them on 
his desk, and began slowly to draw off her gloves. 
“Really, Kenneth, I should think you would be 
sick of it. Such a miserable little salary!” 

“Yes, yes,” he cried, stung to impatience, yet 
half ashamed, for it was none too pleasant to be 
accused by her of financial incompetency; “I know 
it has not been sufficient, Mabel; mine is not a 
money-making business; we must ” 

“Then why don’t you quit it; why on earth don’t 
you do something?” she demanded, her voice sud- 
denly raucous with the pent indignity of virtue long 
suffering and unrewarded, the swan-song of the de- 
cadent middle-class. “Must we go on trying to 
live on a miserable little salary hardly fit for a clerk 
in a department store?” 

“But Mabel, listen! you don’t consider ” 

“Consider!” she went on, contemptuously; “con- 
sider! I don’t care to consider! Haven’t we lived 
quietly and economically ever since we were mar- 
ried, only to find ourselves running behind more 
and more at the end of every month? Yet the 
papers all say that times are getting better every 
day. Why don’t you find some other business, 
Kenneth? Else tell Dr. Little that he has got to 
double your salary. Anyway he ought to be 
ashamed to pay anyone such a mean little sum. I 
always thought the professors in that university 
go t rich!” 

She paused; visions of granite walls, luxurious 
halls with marble wainscoting, faded into a whited 
sepulchre wherein she lay gasping for breath. It, 


£ VOL UTI ON OF A GREA SE-SEO T. 1 79 


too, was all a fraud, she must conclude; neither 
better nor worse than paste diamond or other so- 
ciety make-believe. Once she dreamt that her 
husband had a future; knew beyond doubt that 
he was the intellectual superior of any man she had 
ever met; knew that it was he, moreover, who had 
done more than anyone else to bring the university 
into prominence in all matters of social and econ- 
omic reform. Even the newspapers had something 
to say of him editorially in nearly every issue; cau- 
tiously, uncertainly, it is true, as though vaguely ap- 
prehensive of the ultimate drift of his argument; 
still it was his name, Dr. Kenneth Moore, associate 
professor in sociology — his the name and the force. 
Then again fell athwart her the shadow of Dr. 
Little. Monument of injustice! Aye, she knew 
that no man who spent his life in clubs, wine-sup- 
pers, toadying after millionaires, could possibly be 
worth ten thousand dollars a year if her husband 
were worth only one thousand! 

She rose. “Wait, Mabel; do please listen a mo- 
ment.” He caught her skirt, drawing her unwil- 
lingly towards him so that she sat upon his knee. 
“You see it ” 

“Oh, don’t; don’t argue. You know I hate it. 
But you, it is your study, your delight. Please let 
me go, Kenneth.” 

He released her. She stooped, laboriously, pick- 
ing up her gloves from the floor, hat and wraps 
from his desk, and was passing out when he said: 
“I was only going to say that the lessons could 
probably be managed, Mabel, especially after we 
get moved.” 

“Get moved?” 

“Yes. Hasn’t that real-estate agent been to look 
at the house yet?” 

She turned away. “I have not seen him,” she 


i8o 


GOD'S REBEL. 


answered, leaving' him to himself. Why would 
he persist in piling Pelion upon Ossa! 

No, she had not seen him; hence her husband 
inferred that she knew naught of the matter. There 
is such a vast gulf yawning between to see and to 
know — on convenient occasions. She never pre- 
tended to a nicety of choice in words; mere words, 
which are ever of doubtful utility save in the mouth 
of an expert. 

“You see, Edward,” said Mrs. Mason, in pass- 
ing comment upon this misunderstanding, instance 
of everyday infelicity between young married peo- 
ple who do not yet know their own minds — “you 
see it was this way. Kenneth has some very pecu- 
liar notions on economy, in fact, I believe he makes 
a specialty of it — didn’t you say it was economy, 
Edward? Yes; I’m sure you did. It’s a perfect 
hobby, you know; he rides it to death, and you 
know that's enough to make a perfect miser of any 
man. So he got it into his head that they ought 
to sell their home — think of it, the place where they 
had been born and raised! — and go to live out in 
the suburbs somewhere. Now did you ever hear 
of anything so ridiculous? But it’s just like him — 
he’s his father again all over; headstrong, unrea- 
sonable, unpractical. I declare, it makes me mighty 
sorry for Mabel sometimes when I recollect the 
mixed blood that boy has in his veins. I’m always 
afraid of it; you can’t never tell just when it’s going 
to break out. Pshaw! wasn’t it the craziest piece of 
nonsense you ever heard, him marrying her — the 
doctor, I mean, and his wife? But she was beauti- 
ful, Edward, wasn’t she? And, O my! didn’t he 
just perfectly worship her?” 

She paused abruptly, obedient to some enravish- 
ing vision of the past that held her. Woman-like, 
she never could speak of that affair with any sense 


EVOLUTION OF A GREASE-SPOT. 181 


or patience — and what had she done with her hand- 
kerchief? 

“You were speaking, Helen,” observed Mr. 
Mason with a start at her sudden pause; nor could 
he hope to continue his paper with any satisfaction 
till she began again. The habitual environment of 
the individual shall not be suddenly destroyed with- 
out danger. 

“Oh, I’m sorry, Edward; I’m very sorry I dis- 
turbed you, she apologised hastily. 

“No; it’s no matter, Helen,” he protested, 
soothed again into easeful insensibility as the stream 
flowed on. “Pray continue.” 

“Well, I was only saying, Edward, how it hap- 
pened that Kenneth didn’t come to sell his house. 
It seems he had foolishly made arrangement with 
some real-estate agent to fetch a party to look at 
it. The party was to call on a Friday, and that 
was — let me see — about six weeks ago. Well, 
Mabel came running to tell me about it, just about 
broken-hearted over the matter, and I said to her, 
says I: ‘Mabel, never you mind. When Friday 
comes I’ll be there !’ So, sure enough, I kept track 
of the days, and was over there bright and early 
Friday morning almost as soon as Kenneth had 
left the house. Then I sent Mabel off downtown 
with Miss Nielsen to do some shopping for me, 
and I went to work and straightened up their house. 
Mabel is a very neat housekeeper, too, and there 
wasn’t much to be done wherever she had had a 
hand in the management, I tell you. But land 
sakes! you just ought to have seen the room that 
boy works in. Books scattered all over the room, 
on the floor, on the chairs, and on the desk, and 
most of them wide open just as he left them. But 
I closed them all up and put them away carefully 
on the shelves; then I picked up the papers that 


1 82 


GOD'S REBEL . 


were scattered all over his desk and made one nice, 
neat pile of them and placed a paper weight on top. 
I tell you, I’ll bet he doesn’t know to this day whom 
he has to thank for that, Edward! 

“Then when the doorbell rang I went to the 
door, and there, sure enough, stood the party who 
had come to buy the house. He was all alone, no 
agent nor nobody with him. 

“ ‘Is this house for sale, madam?’ says he, as I 
opened the door, looking sort of forbidding-like, I 
suspect. 

“ ‘Oh no/ says I ; ‘why, I never heard of such a 
thing!’ 

“ ‘In — indeed!’ says he, stammering; ‘pray ex- 
cuse me, madam. I must have made a mistake in 
the number.’ 

“Then I just bowed, you know, sort o’ stiff like, 
and shut the door, and the party went off down the 
street; and Mabel says he never bothered them 
again any more. Now I think that was a very nice 
way out of it. Don’t you, Edward?” 

In response to Mr. Mason’s letter Kenneth called 
as requested, and was introduced to the person he 
had expected to meet. “Mr. Abrams has come to 
me, Kenneth,” explained Mason, “on account of 
that little suit I won against Rockland and his 
Saviour Oil Co. several years ago.” 

“Ah, he is a believer in miracles repeating them- 
selves. Oil is your business, Mr. Abrams?” 

Abrams replied yes, for over twenty years he 
had been with Van Syckel in New Jersey and Titus- 
ville, and Rice of Marietta; was with old Van when 
he first began his experiments on the Jersey flats 
with what he called his continuous process — that 
is, to feed in petroleum at one end and have kerosene 
running continuously out of the other. By the old 
process, he explained, it was necessary to shut 


EVOLUTION OF A GREASE-SPOT , 183 

down every day and cool off; but Van’s contin- 
uous process had stopped all that waste. Then they 
had moved out to Titusville and erected a large re- 
finery. At this point they first came into contact 
with the Saviour Oil Co., which had a little two- 
by-four refinery there at that day, the owner of 
which lived in Cleveland. That was Mr. Rockland. 
Rockland never interfered with them at that time, 
however, as he knew nothing whatever of the prac- 
tical details of the business by which they were 
able to get eighty gallons of kerosene out of one 
hundred gallons of crude oil, whereas he could only 
get sixty-five gallons at the most. 

“Besides,” the man continued, “we were the first 
to build a pipe-line to transport oil. It was Van 
Syckel’s idea, and cost enormously; we had to fight 
the teamsters and the oil combination. It was a 
success, you know, from the very first, but old 
man Van Syckel lost every penny. He had put 
up his pipe-line as security for a debt until the 
profits should wipe it out. In a few months the 
profits had paid his debt, but he never got back his 
pipe-line and hadn’t money enough left to sue for 
it. To-day the Saviour Oil Co. owns it, and the 
old man’s original idea, his pipe-line, has grown 
into a system thousands of miles long.” 

Kenneth took out his note book. Another flag- 
rant instance of the survival of the unfittest. The 
man who had the genius, the skill, the capital, the 
daring, and the ability to put an idea into ex- 
ecution, to-day has nothing; whereas the Saviour 
Oil Co., which never invented, never prospected, 
never experimented, never developed one solitary 
improvement in that commodity is now receiving 
the thanks and the dollars of the civilised world. 
“Go on, Mr. Abrams.” 

“Well, sir, I stayed with Van Syckel, and we 


184 


GOD'S REBEL. 


finally got a lease and broke ground again to put 
up a still. But we had hardly got the pipe and 
brick on the ground when the leading representa- 
tive of the Saviour Co. gave us a call. He wanted 
the old man to accept a salary and not build a re- 
finery in opposition to them. But Van Syckel said: 
'No, I am going to build and run this refinery on 
the continuous plan/ 'Very well/ the Saviour 
combine answered, ‘you can make nothing if you 
do build it. We have arrangements with the rail- 
roads that will prevent it. You can get no cars!’ ” 

“Have you had experience in shipping oil over 
the railroads, Mr. Abrams?” Kenneth interrupted. 

“Oh, yes, a great deal, sir. I was with the Mer- 
rill Oil Co. in Boston when the Saviour people be- 
gan to freeze them out. We owned our own tank- 
cars in which we shipped the crude from Olean to 
Boston. Between those points the rate was fifty 
cents a barrel; but from the railroad station in Bos- 
ton to our refinery, a distance of only two miles, 
the railroad charges were ten dollars a car, or about 
one dollar and a quarter a barrel. We made re- 
peated efforts, personal solicitations, to the railroad 
officers, and to the railroad commis ioners also, 
but it was the established rate, they said.” 

“Do you remember what railroad that was, Mr. 
Abrams?” 

“The New York and New England. They 
charged us six dollars for hauling a car one mile 
and a half.” 

Mr. Mason smiled. “The president of the New 
York and New England R. R. at that time was one 
of the trustees of the Saviour Oil Co.,” he observed. 

Abrams nodded. “Yes, we had to sell our tank- 
cars to the Saviour Oil combination, sir, because 
we no longer had any use for them.” 

“I understand,” Kenneth assured him. “But 


EVOLUTION OP A GREASE-SPOT. 185 

what became of Van Syckel and his continuous 
process — did he build his refinery?” 

“No. It was about half completed when the oil 
combination again called. They said they would 
furnish him money to prove his invention if he 
would only stop building. Accordingly he made a 
» trip to New York and called at the office of one 
of the members of the trust to whom he had been 
directed. This official pretended to be very glad to 
see him, saying that he was very sorry to learn that 
a man of his ability should have been so long unfor- 
tunate in the oil business. ‘We will allow you ten 
thousand dollars to prove your inventions/ said he, 
‘and if they are satisfactory we will pay you one 
hundred thousand dollars for your patents. Mean- 
while we shall allow you a salary of one hundred 
and twenty-five dollars a month to support your 
family/ 

“This being agreed upon,” continued Abrams, 
“the combination demolished his works and carted 
the brick off to the junk-yard. And after keeping 
the old man waiting for over three years, taking 
no measures to test his inventions, they finally in- 
formed him that his process for refining was im- 
practicable. We afterwards proved, though, that 
we could make one thousand barrels of oil in one 
day by his process, whereas it took three or four 
days by the old way.” 

“He tested it himself, did he?” asked Kenneth, 
with growing interest. 

“Oh, yes, sir. We built three independent re- 
fineries only to be ruined and demolished each 
time by the oil combination through the methods 
I have mentioned. The old man finally died, bro- 
ken-hearted, and I went to work for the Saviour 
people. And this, sir, is why I called to see Mr. 
Mason: I have information regarding an explo- 


GOD'S REBEL. 


1 86 

sion of a rival refinery two years ago that was 
planned and accomplished by the trustees of the 
Saviour Oil Co.” 

“Good heavens! Then wh) r have you kept it a 
secret for two years?” 

The man explained, with some confusion, caus- 
ing Kenneth at first to doubt his veracity. The tale 
was too brutal, too barbarous in its ruthless sacri- 
fice of life and property for him to accept it in its 
entirety. History had told him of the slain in bat- 
tle, the murder of courtly intrigue, the savage mas- 
sacre; but in all his knowledge, for cold-blooded 
cunning and red-handed ruin, he had never heard 
anything to compare with this piece of nineteenth 
century villainy on the part of the Saviour Oil Co. 
that Abrams there revealed to him. And this com- 
pany, he reflected quickly whilst Abrams spoke, 
this burning brand of the devil that poses as the 
light of the world, forsooth, is my paymaster; is 
engaged in the noble task of founding universities, 
supporting churches, and endowing libraries ! This 
is the hand that feeds me ! 

Walking home in the night he pondered over it, 
indignantly at first, madly. To think that people 
should bow down and submit themselves as slaves 
to a highwayman oil institution that owned church 
and university, controlled sugar, steel, and count- 
less other trusts, fairly owning the Government 
itself! Finally, however, anger gave place to satire, 
and satire to amusement. After all, what a sublime 
jest it all was, this thing of oil and religion and 
steel going hand in hand, this immaculate trinity 
raised on high for fools to bow to! As a jester, 
Rockland, perhaps, was even superior to that ras- 
cally Constantine, inasmuch as he was richer and 
so more powerful. Then again he became more 
serious, yet thrilled with the optimistic ideals that 


THE FAIRY GOD-MOTHER. 


iS 7 


never quite deserted him. After all, he reflected, 
the very same principle that causes a man to mono- 
polise heaven and earth to his own ends, must in- 
evitably crush him. Why does a monopoly erect 
a university which, in spite of its most watchful 
care, is bound and certain to inculcate principles 
which must shortly result in its paternal monopoly’s 
overthrow? Why? Merely because the desire for 
the esteem of one’s fellows is perhaps the strongest 
passion in man; the robber hates his ostracism, 
hence after robbing us roundly, must needs spend 
millions to purchase the public’s esteem and kindly 
feeling. Every monopoly carries its own imma- 
nent principle of destruction. “The dice of God 
are always loaded.” 

He smiled, recalling Dr. Little’s admonition: 
“Try and concern yourself more with questions 
involving those higher faculties of constructive im- 
agination.” Well, was he not doing so — with a 
vengeance? 


CHAPTER XVI. 

THE FAIRY GOD-MOTHER . 

There is that in the spirit of your true pedagogue 
which is infectious. Not to all of us, of course, 
and especially not to thee, O Pharisee! who were 
born immune, bearing thine armour from primeval 
shores in endless passing review, yesterday, to- 
day, forever, proof incontrovertible of thine im- 
mortality. Nay, nor pedagogues nor ideas shall 
ever infect you. But to one in the professor’s own 
household, as we have seen, his gospel had come as 
a definite key to long-thought intangible things. 

Asked by Mr. Kent when her new manuscript 


1 88 


GOD'S REBEL. 


would be ready, Nannette had answered, pensively, 
that she could not tell. “It requires so much more 
study, more care, more art, more everything, you 
know, Mr. Kent, if one treats of real people instead 
of imaginary.” 

“Dear me! You aren’t doing that, are you?” his 
accents full of solicitude. 

She smiled. Mr. Kent was such an old maid, she 
sometimes thought. “I am trying something,” 
she confessed, “that shall have some little human 
significance. Then if I fail I may return to the 
desert isle. However, there are more than enough 
dilettantes already.” 

Whereat he protested; her words were invidi- 
ous, wholly uncomplimentary to the O. G. Gold- 
smith-Smith Publishing Co. that had “brought her 
out.” — “I believe the professor has infected you.” 
he declared. 

“Infected me!” she objected stoutly. “No, in- 
deed ; I have a heart, Mr. Kent, that is all.” 

Well, but Mr. Kent had a heart, too, so he 
averred, although he never chose to announce it 
publicly. He felt, moreover, quite as strongly 
about matters of everyday economic interests as she 
did; sympathised with her wholly. “But I assure 
you, Miss Nielsen, that the reading public doesn’t 
care a — a dime for all this. It is all a pitfall for 
the inexperienced literary worker.” He had 
watched it for several years; had noted how nearly 
every writer had once tried to give the world one 
book that should do it some good — and had failed. 
Thereafter they had confined their efforts to books 
that would sell. 

“I beg you,” he closed, “not to forsake your 
original work.” 

And a few evenings thereafter had come Mr. 
Goldsmith-Smith, in splendid attire, from the tips 


THE FAIRY GOD-MOTHER. 


189 


of his patent-leathers to the crown of his hat; paid 
for, too, from the profits of The Desert Isle . He 
had heard the report of her back-sliding, and natu- 
rally, as her publisher and well-wisher, was alarmed. 
“The public, my dear Miss Nielsen, is seeking only 
amusement. Wouldn’t you like to go to the thea- 
tre?” 

She thought so, and complied — yes, with genu- 
ine pleasure; ran to get ready. Smith smiled, plac- 
ing a fat little finger in the dimple of his fat little 
chin. “Ah, I thought so,” he said to himself; 
“she is like all the rest of us when she is honest 
with herself; she prefers amusement, too.” 

And she did enjoy it. It was one of those perenni- 
ally picturesque things with mad-cap heroine, impe- 
cunious papa, dashing villain about to foreclose, 
and glorious lover who struts in just in the nick of 
time, hand on his hilt and a “How now, you 
knave!” All very ridiculous, of course, yet she 
laughed and clapped her hands as the curtain rang 
down, causing Mr. Goldsmith-Smith to again 
chuckle and congratulate himself modestly, mus- 
ing the while: “Ah, it’s as I thought. I am the 
only one who truly understands her.” 

Nor was he so very wrong, perhaps; especially 
as hers was one of those happy natures that can 
find momentary pleasure in all things without 
thinking too much at the time. Afterwards, though, 
in the seclusion of her own room, and deep, deep 
in her manuscript, some incident of that play would 
suddenly rise before her, calling out from its hol- 
low of myth and mockery till she would fairly jump 
from her chair, fingers in both ears. Dear me! she 
would exclaim, are we such a little way from the 
chattering ape, after all? 

Her mind at this time was receptive, moreover, 
to an extent that rendered methodical work well- 


GOD’S REBEL. 


190 

nigh impossible. She was going continually; when 
not with Mabel or Kenneth that publishing house 
of hers had a most seductive and bewildering way 
of alternating its favours. Even Mr. Kent, who 
had long renounced theatres, had fallen into the 
way of asking her now and again; and between the 
acts he expatiated. 

“You see how it is, Miss Nielsen; a very ordinary 
play, by an ordinary company, run by a monopolis- 
tic theatre trust for the sole sake of extraordinary 
profits. You see all the old tricks and caricatures 
and unrealities — yet you laugh — enjoy it. When 
you stop to think about it seriously, it doubtless 
all seems very foolish and idiotic. Well, you must 
remember that you are the exception. The public 
has no psychology, never takes thought, and this 
play naturally pleases it. The theatre-trust knows 
this, and takes more interest in serving the ninety- 
and-nine who don’t think than the one who does.” 

“How horrible that seems! Is it the profit-sys- 
tem, too, Mr. Kent?” 

Mr. Kent smiled. “Yes, perhaps; you might ask 
the trust. However, that’s the way it is with every- 
thing — even books. You must write of what is 
universal; and what is so universal as love, no mat- 
ter how put?” 

“I don’t know, really, unless it be ignorance. 
Surely, that is universal. Why can’t one speak of 
it?” 

He shook his head. “You see, the public is sen- 
sitive. If it is a donkey it is also a child; hates to 
have its feelings hurt.” 

“Yet a child has to be punished, you know,” she 
persisted. 

He laughed; she was so little. “If you were 
capable,” said he, “of taking this overgrown re- 
fractory child and giving it a good sound thrashing 


THE FAIRY GOD-MOTHER. 


191 

I should be the last to say no. Not one author in 
a generation has been strong enough; the few that 
have we name heroes; those that have failed, 
cranks.” 

“But,” she implored impatiently, “isn’t it better 
to try, than to be a coward? You are unfair; you 
refuse me even a chance!” 

“No, I beg your pardon; I didn’t mean it so, I 
assure you. To tell the truth, I really believe you 
may be able to punish the public to your heart’s 
content some day. Only not now; wait till your 
readers are assured. There! — there goes the cur- 
tain; it’s the last act. Do you see the fairy god- 
mother, Miss Nielsen? Please don’t forget her yet 
awhile — 

‘They reck but ill who leave me out!’ ” 

When she got home that night she re-read her 
manuscript hurriedly, and again the next morning 
in a vain search for its fairy god-mother. Alas! 
the dear old lady was entirely absent; neither came 
nor went, promised nor threatened; had no part in 
her tale whatsoever. How foolish some men can 
be! she said, and took her story straightway to 
the professor, read him a chapter or two, unfolded 
her entire scheme and design. A tale of the nether 
side of things in a great city; true to the life, but 
unrelieved — oh, very much unrelieved. 

“Little rebel,” said he, tapping her lightly on 
the knuckles with his admonitory blue pencil, “little 
rebel! Don’t; give it up.” 

She glanced at him quickly, discovering a fleet- 
ing, half-wearied expression she had seen much of 
late. 

“O dear! Mr. Kent says I have forgotten the 
fairy god-mother.” 

“Yes, I’m afraid that you have,” he agreed, smil- 
ing; “not even a millionaire sailing by in his yacht 


IQ2 


GOD’S REBEL . 


to save the poor hero from drowning. Oh, no; it 
will never do. The world would never believe it. 
Little rebel, go back to your desert isle!” 

“Nonsense!” she cried in vexation, rising and 
stamping one little foot — “nonsense! I sha’n’t. No 
one believes in me; but I sha’n’t write any more 
trash!” Out of the room she flew. 

Then for days she never touched pen to paper; 
resolved to give up literature altogether; it was 
all such a fraud, anyway. She would devote her- 
self wholly to music, engaging forthwith a famous 
instructor who flattered her. “Ah, mees, vat a 
hand for the violin! You a splendid tone have ac- 
quired yourself already.” 

And of course Mr. Goldsmith-Smith heard of it, 
and Mr. Kent. They called and protested sep- 
arately, conjointly; but protested and called in 
vain. 

“She is ruining herself,” said Kent. 

“Yes, and us, too,” agreed Oliver; “our custom- 
ers are fairly clamouring for something by the 
author of The Desert Isle.” 

“Well, they’ll have to wait,” Sam returned 
gloomily. 

“But why the devil can’t she be reasonable, Sam? 
It’s all from living in the same house with Moore. 
He’d make an angel discontented!” 

“Nonsense! he’s not the cause, I tell you; re- 
grets it as much as we do. He has enough on his 
own hands at present, without involving her.” 

“You mean with the men at Wheeling?” 

“No, not altogether. It’s oil, Oliver; oil! He’s 
found a grease-spot on the threshold of his alma- 
mater — a particularly offensive grease-spot. Un- 
like Balzac’s pen de chagrin, the spot grows larger 
instead of smaller the more he meditates and as- 
pires, until it now covers the entire university — he 


THE FAIRY GOD-MOTHER. 


193 


informed me the other day that the trail of the 
serpent, I mean the grease-spot, is over it all. Oil 
is devilish bad stuff to spread, after all.” 

“Gad! such a fellow!” 

“But he’s one of God’s rebels, I tell you.” 

“Bah! And so is the devil.” 

Kent smiled. “Possibly,” he admitted; “yet 
one makes for God, I believe, and the other against 
him. That is, unless you claim that competition 
is the same in religion as in other industries — the 
life of trade. Where would the church have been 
but for the devil?” 

Howbeit the professor, as may readily be in- 
ferred, had not been asked to deliver that course of 
lectures in Dr. Griggs’ church for the purpose of 
allaying popular discontent; what was better, 
though, Mabel had recently obtained a position in 
his choir that had enabled her to take up her lessons 
with the coveted celebrated Polish professor with- 
out asking Kenneth for further assistance. True, 
she did not like this arrangement, wholly; was 
none too fond of church music, and even less of 
Dr. Griggs’ sermons. “Still, you don’t need to 
listen, Mabel,” her husband had said; “you must 
try and accustom yourself to thinking of some- 
thing profitable whilst he is speaking. Any church- 
goer can do this after awhile.” 

As for himself, he often went with Mabel; Dr. 
Griggs’ sermons always amused him immensely; 
they were so replete with theology and so utterly 
devoid of even the most elemental principles of 
biology. One would think, he would often find 
himself saying, that the two have nothing whatever 
in common — a God, obviously, who has nothing 
to do with life. 

Yet wereTthere times when, rising to join in 
the music or other exercise of the vast congrega- 


13 


194 


GOD'S REBEL . 


tion, he would be struck all at once with consterna- 
tion akin to despair. How was it possible, he 
mused, that he had come to stand so aloof from 
his fellow-men in all that they counted religion? 
Were his own enthusiastic and glowing beliefs, 
ideals, aspirations, less sacred and holy than theirs 
that he should feel thus ostracised in their midst? 
Or could it be that his ear alone, in all that multi- 
tude, caught the far-off strains of the martial on- 
coming hosts of democracy, rising always above 
the harsh voice of good Dr. Griggs as he went 
on pounding into the heads of his listeners the 
very latest theories respecting the vital subject of 
his morning’s discourse, to wit, Recognition after 
Death? 

And yet, as Kenneth knew, this minister had 
frequently expressed surprise that many people 
were ceasing to attend church, workingmen es- 
pecially; but alas! it seemed quite impossible for 
Dr. Griggs to understand it, why the many had 
lost interest in this columned and vaulted sepul- 
chre of so-called religion that had so persistently 
outraged their holiest convictions of morality and 
utilitarianism. “I know nothing of art, nothing 
of literature, of science, of sociology,” the preacher 
had once stoutly protested from his pulpit: “all I 
know is Jesus Christ, and of him only shall I speak 
to you fifty-two Sundays in the year.” That there 
was anything essentially immoral in such a declara- 
tion of agnosticism had doubtless never occurred 
to the preacher. 

On still another morning, fearing by habit what 
the pastor was doomed to say, the professor’s eyes 
had roamed hopelessly round the room as if seeking 
relief in vain, but resting at last on an inscription on 
the wall — 


THE FAIRY GOD-MOTHER. 


195 

“We are all here present before God, to hear all things 
that are commanded thee of God.” — Acts x, 33. 

Ah, does that mean, I wonder, he found himself 
asking, exultantly, whether we are actually here 
to hear what God says now, to-day, or only what 
he is alleged to have said several thousand years 
ago in the Bible? Are we to have biology or the- 
ology? 

The puzzle was solved directly by Dr. Griggs 
rising and announcing his text: “Keep me as the 
apple of thine eye.” 

Ah, I feared it, sighed the professor, settling 
down in his pew; it’s on faith and holy supersti- 
tion. Let us hear what God said to the intelli- 
gent public of four thousand years ago. Obviously 
their needs are our needs. What he says to-day 
isn’t of the slightest consequence. 

Dr. Grig'gs spoke on; told first of the wonder- 
ful anatomy of the eye, in man and other animals, 
especially the fish; not forgetting those fishes of 
the Mammoth Cave — no preacher ever forgets 
them! — which, poor things, are blind! Hence 
proving the perfect adaptation of the eye to its 
environment. “And even so,” said he, “men adapt 
their moral natures to their environment.” 

The professor jumped. Good heavens! did the 
minister actually say that, or had he been dream- 
ing? No; there it was again: “I say that men 
must adapt their moral natures to their environ- 
ment.” And then, squarely on top of this unfortu- 
nate biologic truism, came the contradictory com- 
mand: “Keep me as the apple of thine eye!” 

Kenneth smiled. Clearly people did have a 
most reprehensible way of adapting their moral 
natures to their environment; ’twas inevitable; oc- 
casioned all their misery. He was amused that the 
preacher should see anything to commend in such 


196 


GOD’S REBEL . 


an evil necessity. Our environment being false, it was 
plainly our duty to change it, to make it right; 
but instead of that, he was telling his congregation 
to adapt their moral natures to it. I wonder if he 
wants us to become rogues and rascals altogether? 
O egregious Dr. Griggs! You are in a very pretty 
pickle now. How can you ever contrive to get out 
of it? 

Howbeit Dr. Griggs became suddenly shy of 
biology and confined himself strictly to his the- 
ology: “Keep me as the apple of thine eye.” A 
sermon for faith pure and simple; a sermon en- 
treating men to do the impossible in business, in so- 
ciety, in spite of their moral natures and environ- 
ment. He eliminated all the forces of life, telling 
his congregation that everything would come out 
all right if they only preserved their natural su- 
perstition, kept it as the apple of their eye, — en- 
vironment and moral natures to the contrary not- 
withstanding! 

The preacher neared his peroration and the room 
became solemn, hushed. He had spoken of eternal 
life, and was now giving warning of its eternal 
antithesis, Kenneth glanced round him; the con- 
gregation for the greater part was listening re- 
spectfully, but vaguely; no one seemed to be very 
much alarmed. They were all, men, women 
and children, trying to do the best they could, and 
if God condemned them to eternal darkness they 
were manifestlv helpless to change things. Peo- 
ple must live, firstly; must get along the best they 
can; the Laws of Life were eternally paramount 
to the Theories of Death. Mr. Rockland and Dr. 
Little sat well up in front where people could see 
them; when the preacher at last lowered his voice 
to a raucous whisper, admonitory hand aloft : 
“Fire! fire! fire!” Mr. Rockland started visibly 


DR. LITTLE “ POUNCED UPON P 197 

and glanced up in alarm. Manifestly he had been 
thinking of his oil tanks. 


CHAPTER XVII. 

DR. LITTLE IS “POUNCED UPON." 

For several weeks Kenneth and Mr. Mason 
had been hard at work on the story recited by 
Abrams. Together they investigated the details, 
examined and cross-examined their witness, made 
every act of his life clear and intelligible to them- 
selves. Whole days and almost nights were spent 
in the task; the Saviour Oil Co. must be traced 
from the moment of its conception, some thirty- 
five years ago, down to its present high and aston- 
ishing seat in the heart of the Government itself. 
Pathway strewn with the wreck of its rivals, aban- 
doned works; insane asylums crowded for space, 
but with memorial rooms and windows endowed 
by the Saviour Oil Co. Napoleon crossing the 
Alps and founding an Empire, with no vision as 
yet of the lightning of Waterloo. 

Still, to write the whole history of the Law of 
Compensation, of Retribution, one has but to de- 
scribe a circle. 

“These are the facts, Mr. Mason,” said Kenneth, 
“which I have been able to gather from an investi- 
gation by Congress in 1872. A contract was made 
between this Saviour Oil Co. and every railroad 
having access to the oil regions, by which the latter 
agreed as follows: 

1. To double freight rates. 

2. Not to charge them the increase in 

freight rates. 


GOD’S REBEL . 


T98 

3. To give them the increase in freight 

collected from all competitors. 

4. To make any other changes of rates 

necessary to guarantee their success 

in business. 

5. To destroy their competitors by high 

freight rates. 

6. To spy out the details of their com- 

petitors’ business. 

For several moments Mr. Mason made no reply. 
“Are you aware, Kenneth,” he asked finally, “of 
what this may mean to you? Of course none but 
a fool would assert that you have made these in- 
vestigations through envy or malice, or in any 
cause save that of truth and justice. Still, the 
world is an ass, you know, and it has a vicious kick 
backwards.” 

Soberly, with sincerity, the young man an- 
swered: “Yes, I know how that is — how it has 
ever been with the world. But that doesn’t con- 
cern me, I have nothing to do with that side of 
the question. I am neither a crank nor a fanatic, 
and have given my whole life to this work in the 
name of science and society — in the name of God! 
I believe, moreover, that we are on the eve of a tre- 
mendous awakening, a grand readjustment.” 

“Oh yes, I agree with you,” answered Mason, 
his penholder in his mouth, “there is no doubt of 
the conditions, of the awakening, and of your per- 
fect sweetness of purpose. Still, a man must live 
and support his family, Kenneth. It is right, of 
course, for the scholar and thinker to probe to the 
bottom of these social lies and seek with all his 
might to overthrow them. But society demands 
that he shall also continue to live, and live well. 
You know it’s but a sad day for prophets without 
means. Were Christ to preach to-day he must 


DR. LITTLE “POUNCED UPON.” 199 

first be a millionaire, else die a second time on the 
cross. But you have thought of these things, of 
course.” 

Silence followed the words. Yes, he knew so- 
ciety was ruthless, that it was not and never had 
been in a position where it could afford to be mag- 
nanimous; a harridan with the mask of innocence, 
that would fight to retain possession of its mask 
to the last breath. Still, such thoughts were merely 
theory, he had never felt their reality; hence he 
asked, but with more of assurance than apprehen- 
sion : 

“You think this case may endanger my position 
in the university?” 

“Why, surely — it is bound to,” replied Mason, 
pleased that he had been spared more than the 
hint. “Consider what you now have on your 
hands: Wheeling on the verge of a strike which, I 
believe, try as you will, you will be wholly unable 
to prevent; secondly, this case against the Saviour 
Oil Co. ; and thirdly, no end of trouble with 
the Consolidated Gas Co., which is simply a branch 
of the oil trust. Now then, where does the univer- 
sity get its money? Do you think the oil trust 
is going to pay you for trying to overthrow them? 
Nor does the matter stop there. We read in the 
Republican an editorial one day on the fallacy of 
public ownership of railways, and the very next day 
the same newspaper teems with particulars by 
which one man is about to take under his own con- 
trol over fifty thousand miles of railways. More- 
over, this very man is at the head of that same 
thieving syndicate that cleared fifteen millions of 
dollars off of our people in less than two weeks’ 
time on a recent government bond sale. Railroad, 
oil, bond, university, you perceive the trail of the 
combination. And yet you deliberately go to work 


200 


GOD’S REBEL . 


to fight this thing whilst in the pay of it, and ex- 
pect to continue drawing your salary! It is non- 
sense, Kenneth. Give it up, and we’ll drop this 
case against the oil trust just as it stands!” 

Recant! Recant! The world would have con- 
tinued to revolve just the same if it hadn’t been for 
Galileo, as it had for thousands of years in the 
past and would persist for thousands to come. But 
why should Truth, w T hich has its bread and butter 
to earn, be so foolish as to openly defy Falsehood. 
Verily, the Italian was an ass! 

“No, Mr. Mason,” answered the young man 
firmly, — the dreamer, the vapid visionist, the im- 
practicable theorizer, the monkey-browed, short- 
legged sermonizer and addle-pated disciple of envy 
and pessimism who pretended to teach economics 
whilst feathering his own nest, — as the Republican's 
editorial writer was beginning to refer to him, — 
“No, it is not merely a matter of principle, but one 
which, I believe, is to determine my whole future 
career, as showing whether or not the profession 
which I have adopted can be made an instrument 
for the service of truth and science, furthering the 
well-being of society, or whether it must remain, as 
in the past, a mere prop for plutocracy, a buckle 
by which to strap the saddle the tighter to the back 
of struggling humanity. No, I’ll fight it to my 
last breath.” 

Mr. Mason got up, walked to the window and 
looked out without seeing anything. Returning to 
where Kenneth sat, he placed his hand on his 
shoulder with a touch that swore to its truth. “By 
heavens, then, I’m with you! We’ll sift this thing to 
the bottom! We’ll give ’em hell! Do you hear?” 

Kenneth smiled, rising to his feet as they shook 
hands; and shortly departed, leaving Mr. Mason 
scribbling away furiously. 


201 


DR. LITTLE “ POUNCED UFO NR 

That night he spoke at one of the principal gath- 
ering places of the Y. M. C. A., his subject being 
“Charles Kingsley and the Chartist Movement.” 
Speaking of Parson Lot’s fight in behalf of the 
starving tailors — what time they were mere slaves 
of the sweat-shop, their clothing in pawn, and 
barely enough to cover them save for the gar- 
ment on which they were at work, until the govern- 
ment was forced to establish its own clothing fac- 
tory at Pimlico — he came at last to notice the sub- 
stantial difference in the social movement of that 
time and to-day. “Then,” said he, “it rested almost 
wholly on sentiment, whilst to-day it is based on 
the arithmetic of economics. Once it was but a 
question for the heart, now it is for the head, to- 
gether with the heart, to decide, nay, to compel. 
Shall we continue to hold it right for man to rob his 
brother, to possess the power of denying him means 
to work out his subsistence, and so drive him to des- 
pair and often to suicide ? Drink, improvidence, ig- 
norance, these three have been the comfortable excuse 
of the church and the wealthy in the midst of all 
this poverty and suffering. Yet these three are 
merely the result, not the cause, of a man’s misery. 
Remember, the poor in general have not that in- 
fallible fountain of Lethe, the library, nor the edu- 
cation that goes with it, to which they can always 
turn and find forgetfulness when discouraged. We 
seek a book, a novel, usually, written merely to 
entertain, and lo ! the clouds vanish. But they? 
when come the interminable hours, the mountain- 
wall of wrong usage, the strike, the starving little 
ones at home whose necessities grow as their wages 
sink lower and lower — they turn to drink! drink! 
drink! They would go mad if they didn’t!” 

Drawing a circle on the blackboard behind him, 
he continued: “This is what the labourer produces, 


202 


GOD’S REBEL, 


whilst this” — marking off one-quarter of the cir- 
cle — “is what he is paid. Is it any wonder that he 
is poor, or is there anyone who will explain to us 
how this proportion will be appreciably enlarged if 
the labourer stops drinking, stops being improvi- 
dent, being ignorant? No; these vast inequalities 
in society rest not upon temperament, but false 
economics. Turn your condemnatory glances not 
upon the sight of starving recipients of charity, but 
towards those seats where the mighty arrogate to 
themselves the privilege of dividing this circle, one- 
fourth of which they fling to the producers, whilst 
the remainder goes to swell their coffers. Here 
you will find the cause, and the remedy, for what 
is falsely so-termed the profound social question , 
the germ of all crime, the factory that grinds out 
criminals and outcasts by the million. Look to 
your arithmetic, I say!” 

From this point he went on to speak of the evolu- 
tion of industry in older countries; from the little 
workshop into the giant manufacturing plant, 
thence into the trust, and thence into the govern- 
ment. One by one all forms of business were tend- 
ing that way. In Germany, he explained, twenty 
years ago they were having the same trouble with 
their private railroad systems as we are suffering to- 
day. But Lassalle had taught them, and Bismarck, 
profiting by his advice, had made the railroads, 
telephones, telegraphs, express, part and parcel of 
the government, of society — no longer a hawk to 
prey upon it. And so in France, Great Britain an*d 
her colonies. True, the evolution was slow, but it 
had taught us what to expect from now on in this 
country. “There is a difference between capital 
and the capitalist; the former, being created by 
society and withheld, belongs to society; the latter 
is an intolerable nuisance, no more to be borne 


DR. LITTLE “POUNCED UPON” 203 

and endured than king, priest or other supersti- 
tious tyranny. Society can be its own capitalist.” 

About a week after this, on getting home to din- 
ner late one evening, Mabel handed him a letter. 
Breaking the seal, an expression of infinite disgust, 
heightened with anger, swept over his face, as he 
read it hurriedly and threw it aside. 

“What is it?” Mabel asked; but recovering him- 
self quickly, he would say nothing; laughing and 
jesting throughout the meal. Half an hour later, 
however, Mabel entered his study and found him 
pondering over the letter lying open on his desk. 

“May I read it, Kenneth?” 

“Oh, certainly; if you wish.” 

She read it aloud. “ ‘My dear Doctor Moore. 
Your speech at the Y. M. C. A. has caused me a 
great deal of annoyance. It is hardly safe for me 
to venture into any of the city clubs. I am pounced 
upon from all sides. I propose that during the 
remainder of your connection with the university 
you exercise great care in public utterances about 
questions that are agitating the minds of the peo- 
ple. Furthermore, I must insist that you imme- 
diately cease all connection with that case pending 
against the Saviour Oil Co. Truly yours, Ephraim 
Adams Little, President Rockland University/ ” 

All Mabel’s quick temper was aroused at this 
injustice. “Poor old Prexy,” she mocked; “he 
can’t even go to the clubs for a banquet or a quiet 
drink with his friends without being pounced upon! 
Oh, Kenneth, what can a man do in such a world? 
Don’t you see it is hopeless? But you’ll drop this 
case he speaks of, won’t you, dear?” 

He shook his head. “Don’t you know, with the 
evidence that I have secured, I should be no bet- 
ter than a criminal to step down and out at this 
stage; neither better nor worse than that liveryman 


204 


GOD'S REBEL . 


who was arrested the other day for concealing a 
gang of men in his haymow whom he knew were 
wanted by the police to answer to a charge of mur- 
der?” 

“But we are all criminals, Kenneth,” she cried, 
frowning petulantly, “so what under heavens is 
the use of a conscience such as yours? Why can’t 
you wink at these things the same as others do? 
Don’t you see that we cannot afford to be honest 
in accordance to your interpretation? Dear me! 
it is hard to believe that — that God does these 
things, creates a man with truth in his heart merely 
to hurl him pell-mell into the poorhouse. No, no, 
it must be you who are mistaken, Kenneth! You 
must be wrong! All the world is against you! You 
see what Dr. Little hints about the remainder of 
your connection with the university?” 

Yes, he knew it was ominous — more than a 
threat. “Nevertheless, Mabel, this evidence that 
I have obtained against the oil company was dis- 
covered outside of my position in the university. 
Now if I can no longer live and act as an hon- 
ourable citizen of a free republic, bearing my share 
of its responsibilities and at the same time retaining 
my connection with the university, why then it 
merely proves ” 

“That you will be discharged — that’s what it 
proves!” declared Mabel. “And then, Kenneth — 
what can you do then?” 

And in spite of his protests Mabel was not con- 
vinced. Her wants and expenses being considerable, 
she could not help feeling that it was her husband’s 
first duty to make it possible for her to live in the way 
that she had always been accustomed. Other men 
were able to do this, and Kenneth could surely do the 
same if he would only stop being so silly about trying 
to reform society. And thinking of it so, their es- 


DR. LITTLE “POUNCED UPON.” 205 

trangement grew; she seldom attempted to "rea- 
son” with him any more, as her Aunt Helen ad- 
vised, insisting the while that she was “just right!” 
In fact, all the world seemed to agree with her, to 
be on her side, save her Uncle Edward, and oc- 
casionally Nannette. From Mabel’s point of view, 
a husband’s first duty was to support his wife; if he 
could do this honestly, so much the better; if not, 
then let him stretch his honour to meet the con- 
ditions. In this position she was clearly supported 
by wise Dr. Griggs : “Men must adapt their moral 
natures to their environment.” 

“Do you know,” said Nannette in speaking of 
this to her friend, Mrs. Phillips, “I can’t help feeling 
very sorry for Mabel? She hasn’t even the remotest 
interest in this battle her husband is fighting, yet 
must share all the discomfort.” 

“Has he decided to sell their home?” 

Nannette nodded. “Sometimes I feel that he 
doesn’t really care very much for her; if he did he 
could not go on this way; would think more of the 
consequences of his course as affecting her. Don’t 
you think so?” 

Enid glanced up. “He might,” she admitted; 
“but don’t you think it would be a misfortune if 
he did?” 

“Y — yes, perhaps it would,” Nannette replied, 
her forehead puckering thoughtfully between her 
bright little eyes. “Oh dear! what a puzzle it all 
is, anyway! \A man’s selfish or domestic interests 
are in direct conflict with the good of society at 
large. I don’t wonder the professor maintains 
there is something wrong at the bottom. If a man 
loves his family and wishes to provide for it lib- 
erally, he must say to the public, like Vanderbilt — 
you know what he said! But if, unfortunately, he 


206 


GOD’S REBEL . 


loves the public, is a true Democrat at heart, he 
must address those same words to his family/’ 

“You think he realises that, Nannette — that he 
must make this choice?” 

“Who, the professor? Oh, yes, of course he 
does; but you know he thinks it so strange that 
people can waste their time in prating about Chris- 
tianity, instead of setting hard at work to alter these 
economic institutions which make Christianity im- 
possible.” 7 

Meanwhile, in reply to Dr. Little’s letter, Ken- 
neth had written him on the following day, cour- 
teously yet firmly, that whatever evidence he had 
been able to secure against the oil company was 
his own affair, the affair of every honest and truth- 
seeking citizen, and hence had nothing whatever 
to do with his capacity of professor in a great 
American university. He was deeply pained to 
learn that any conduct or expressions of his had 
served to make club-life in any manner less pleas- 
urable, less stimulating, to the president of the uni- 
versity than had hitherto been the case. Oppor- 
tunities for the pursuit of the higher life, towards 
the Over-Soul, were indeed so few in a great city 
of this sort with its numerous vulgar and worldly 
claims, that he trusted the president might see fit 
to withdraw this accusation against him, or at least 
to be so kind as to accept this reply as ample 
apology and testimony of his profound regrets. 
He had no doubt that the president, through his 
inherent qualities of sweetness and tact and the 
many cultivated resources of his intellect, would 
again be able to overcome all obstacles, fatuous 
pretenders to the throne, and take once more that 
position at the head of society and club-life for 
which all his friends were unanimous in claiming 
that he was divinely appointed. 


DR. LITTLE “POUNCED UPON.” 207 

True, he did not write these words, at least not 
all of them; but such were the tiny imps of Satan, 
laughing, threatening, and coaxing by turn, that 
followed his pen and went capering across his page 
as he wrote. Still, it was a very polite letter, and 
after his blotter had rested upon it and his fist 
travelled across it there were no imps discoverable 
to the naked eye; at least not to a man whose 
vanity was so globose and roly-poly as Dr. Little’s. 
Moreover he had stated, briefly, yet with that sen- 
tient pen that tells the despair of an enthusiast’s 
love, however hastily or carelessly written, the work 
that he had hoped to do. Merely a glimpse of the 
young man’s soul, but which, nevertheless, caught 
the scholarly eye of Dr. Little on the instant and 
gave him a slight twinge at the heart as he wiped 
his spectacles. 

“Ah, why couldn’t he have been sensible — why 
couldn’t he! And I had thought that this depart- 
ment of economics was so perfectly balanced! 
Well, well.” He grasped his gold-mounted pen 
and wrote: — 

“My dear Doctor Moore — Your very courteous 
and kindly communication is just received, and I 
hasten to assure you that you are to borrow no 
trouble, no trouble whatsoever, because of any per- 
sonal discomfort you may have caused me. Such 
matters, while infinitely annoying at the time, are 
possibly of not so much importance as we are apt 
to think — in fact, I am convinced that they are not. 

“Regarding your future plans, I had hoped that, 
as time passed, there would be opportunity for 
your doing a larger amount of work in the univer- 
sity proper. Instead, however, the doors seem 
to be closing. I am persuaded that in the long 
run you can do in another institution, because of 
the peculiar circumstances here, a better and more 


208 


GOD \S REBEL . 


satisfactory work to yourself than you can do here. 
1 am personally very much attached to you. You 
are, however, man of the world enough to know 
that, unless one is in the best environment, he 
cannot work to the best advantage. You are so 
well-known and your ability so widely recognised, 
that there will surely be no difficulty in securing 
for you a good position, one in which you will be 
monarch, and one in which vou will be, above all 
things else, independent.” 

Ah, thought Kenneth, as he finished it, is there 
then no independence even in our universities, 
and must they confess it thus shamelessly? Why, 
the greatest opposition that our movement meets 
on the part of intelligent people is the fear, with 
work provided for all, that there would then be 
no independence! Yet where is the independence 
to-day so far as to the mere extent of right doing? 
If it is not in the university, then is it in factory, 
store, or counting-room? Where is the independ- 
ent man in this home of the free? where the man 
who dares even to be honest and truth-telling in 
simple things concerning his or his employer’s bus- 
iness? Show him to me — poor fellow! pitiable 
slave! whether president of college or priest in his 
pulpit — and I’ll show you his shackles. They are 
forged of gold; placed on his hands by the almighty 
power of private capital, seeking ever to gratify its 
own greed! Ah, would the day never dawn when 
men and women might realise that this truth was 
not sentiment, nor oratory, demagoguery, but a bald 
statement of fact for their own well-being. 


THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD . 


209 


CHAPTER XVIII.* 

THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD. 

Early in May Kenneth received notice from Mr. 
Mason that the case of the State vs. The Saviour 
Oil Co. would come up for trial at Buffalo on the 
tenth of the month. For several weeks he had 
been in correspondence with Abrams’ old partner, 
one John Marks, against whose refinery the con- 
spiracy of the oil trust had been aimed. Marks 
had been informed that Abrams had been discov- 
ered, was repentant, and willing to testify freely 
as to his connection with the plot to destroy their 
own refinery in accordance with his purchase by 
the trust. Would Marks be disposed to assist in 
this prosecution of the highwaymen and cutthroats 
who had wrecked his property and ruined his busi- 
ness? 

“If Marks does reply that he is ready to stand 
by us,” Mason had said, “it will be almost the only 
instance in the history of this company’s career 
when any victim has dared to come up boldly and 
tell the truth. Hitherto they have always been 
frightened to death or bought off for the merest 
pittance.” 

But Marks was not for sale. The doubts that 
hovered uncomfortably in their minds were quickly 
dispelled by the vigorous, manly tone of the man’s 
first reply. And when at Buffalo a few weeks later 
“he stood up to take the oath,” to quote from the 

* The facts confirmatory of this chapter may be read in 
the Congressional report on Trusts, 1888, or in Mr. Henry D. 
Lloyd’s “Wealth Against Commonwealth.” 

14 


210 


GOD’S REBEL . 


New York World , “and confronted the men with 
whom he had been at swords-point for six years, 
men of unlimited wealth and almost unlimited in- 
fluence, and controlling the most gigantic mono- 
poly of any age or any country, John Marks looked, 
as a good observer said, what he proved himself to 
be, a fighter, who will never know when he is 
whipped. Hard knocks and a struggle of years 
against an all-powerful enemy have whitened his 
hair, and set firm, hard lines about his face. His 
eyes are deep-set under a protruding forehead and 
black, bushy lashes, and are dark, firm and search- 
ing.” 

“Your business has been, Mr. Marks?” began 
the district-attorney. 

“The manufacture of oil, sir, for the past fifteen 
years,” he replied; and with the prompting of a 
question here and there, he proceeded to tell his 
story in a manner concise and convincing to the 
jury, of wonderful interest to the spectators, and 
of infinite jest and merriment to the well-groomed 
and polished millionaire stock-holders of the trust 
who sat there blinking and winking among their 
hired mouth-pieces ; the Hon. Potiphar Phillips tow- 
ering majestically in their midst and lazily roaring 
out now and then : “I object.” 

Up to 1873 Marks was a farmer in Wyoming 
County. At this time he formed the acquaintance of 
Abrams, who had come to prospect on his farm for 
oil. Abrams had told him that he was then a 
stock-holder of the Vacuum Oil Co. of Rochester, 
but that the trust was getting too powerful for him 
in that locality and that he should be forced to sell 
out and go into new territory where the facilities 
for transportation were not all monopolised by the 
trust. Accordingly he had gone back to Rochester 
and worked for some time in the employ of Abrams, 


THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD . 


21 1 


learning the details of oil refining and the mystery 
of transportation, whereby their rates were sud- 
denly and without notice increased from one hun- 
dred to a thousand per cent, and their oil supply 
very frequently shut off altogether. Then when 
the Vacuum Co. was sold to the trust, he and 
Abrams had gone to Buffalo to start an independ- 
ent refinery. 

“Why did you select Buffalo as the site of your 
industry?” he was asked. 

“Because, sir, that city was then a free town. An 
independent refining company — the Atlas — was 
then constructing an independent pipe-line from 
the oil regions to Buffalo. This made Buffalo the 
best point for establishing refining industries in 
the country.” 

“Did your former employers know about your 
plans when you left them?” he was asked. 

“Yes, sir, we told them squarely,” he answered, 
“and the very first question asked was: ‘Where are 
you going to get your oil?’ I told him, ‘Of the 
Atlas Co/ ‘Humph!’ said he, ‘you will wake up 
one of these mornings to find that there is no Atlas 
Co. As gentlemen,’ he continued, ‘I respect you, 
but as to the Buffalo Lubricating Oil Company 
I shall do all in my power to injure or destroy 
you.’ ” 

Marks then explained how in spite of all threats 
of the trust, with the independent pipe-line to sup- 
ply them, they had at first been so successful as to 
cause the price of oil to the public to drop from 
twelve cents to six cents in Buffalo, and from twen- 
ty cents to eight cents in Boston. 

“I object!” shouted Potiphar, awaking with a 
start. 

“Your Honour,” urged the district attorney, “I 
am merely proving the ability of this man to make 


212 


GOD'S REBEL . 


oil — to show that his ultimate failure did not come 
from his unfitness.” 

The judge nodded, and the district-attorney pro- 
ceeded. 

“How many barrels of lubricating oil could you 
make in a day, and what was the average profit?” 

“Seventy barrels, sir, on an average, at a profit 
of five dollars a barrel — say three hundred dollars a 
day.” 

“And the cost of your investment?” 

“About fifteen thousand dollars, sir, all told.” 

A number of other witnesses followed corrobor- 
ative of Marks’ testimony, and finally his former 
partner, Joe Abrams, took the stand. 

He began at the outset of his career, telling the 
story of his experiences in the oil business in much 
the same way that he had previously related them 
to Kenneth, and coming down to his employment 
and ownership in the Vacuum Oil Co. Hardly had 
he left their service and become a partner in the 
Buffalo Lubricating Oil Co. when he was ap- 
proached by an agent of the Vacuum Co. “Don’t 
you think,” insinuated the emissary, “that it would 
be better for you to leave these men, Mr. Abrams, 
and have twenty thousand dollars deposited to your 
wife’s credit than go with these parties?” 

“No, sir,” he had answered; “I went with them 
in good faith, and I propose to stay.” 

“But it will only be a matter of a few days with 
the Buffalo institution at the very furthest,” per- 
sisted the agent. “We shall crush them out, and 
you will lose what little you have got.” 

Abrams was then taken into their confidence; 
they showed him statements proving conclusively 
that there was no money in oil. “We have other 
ways of making money, of meeting our dividends, 
that you know nothing of,” they urged. To make 


THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD. 213 

oil was a great mistake; there was no need of 
making it, the public didn’t buy any, it was merely 
a superstition on the part of the people to fancy 
that they or anybody else could make money in 
such a useless and disgusting occupation. Of course 
they had to keep their machinery running, the pub- 
lic and the labouring men would make a big fuss 
if they were to shut down completely, but as to 
there being any money in it — why it was the great- 
est delusion of the age, and they opened their 
books to Abrams to prove it! 

They omitted to speak of the year just passed, 
however, wherein they had paid out three hundred 
thousand dollars in dividends on a capital of only 
one hundred thousand. They showed no statement 
of this. Abrams was gulled as readily as other 
members of the public. His occupation had been 
that of a skilled labourer, not an office trickster. 
The very years of strict, intelligent service which 
he had devoted to learning and perfecting methods 
of manufacturing, had been time misspent, accord- 
ing to modern interpretation — he was unfit, 
couldn’t “keep books,” as the man who took ad- 
vantage of him did. 

“When did the representatives of the Vacuum 
Co. next approach you?” he was asked. 

He thought a moment, then replied: “It was 
while we were building the refinery and putting 
in the stills. There was no one else capable of 
directing this work but myself, yet at the request of 
the Vacuum people I travelled from Buffalo to 
Rochester for another interview, because their 
threats were beginning to frighten me. It was all 
the money I had in the world and I couldn’t afford 
to lose it. Their threats almost worried me to 
death. When I got to Rochester my old employer 
said to me: ‘You have made a great mistake by 


214 


GOD'S REBEL . 


going out with those fellows. If you stay with 
them you will lose all you’ve got. We are going to 
commence suit against them, besides serving an 
injunction against them to stop their work. If you 
are in there you will be responsible, and lose every- 
thing; but if you will come back and work for us 
we shall make everything satisfactory to you.’ 
Well, I remained in Rochester a day or two and 
finally went to consult my lawyer, Mr. Trueworthy, 
about it.” 

“Wait a moment,” interrupted the district-at- 
torney. “Did you go to your lawyer all alone?” 

•“No, sir, my old employer went with me,” re- 
plied Abrams, “and he said to my lawyer: 'We 
have come to see what disposition can be made of 
Abram’s property.’ My attorney looked puzzled 
and I said: They are going to bust the company 
up. I am an endorser on one of its notes, and if 
I do not come back with the Vacuum, what prop- 
erty and money I have will be taken from me.’ My 
employer then urged Mr. Trueworthy to tell of 
some way that I could get out of the Buffalo Lu- 
bricating Co. After thinking a moment he an- 
swered that the only way I could get out was to 
leave and take the consequences; that if I violated 
my contract I should be liable for damages as well 
as debts.” 

“What did your old employer say to that?” 
asked the district-attorney. 

“Well, sir, he said he knew of another way,” 
answered Abrams; “he asked my attorney: 'Sup- 
pose he should arrange the machinery so it would 
bust up or smash up, what would the consequences 
be?’ 

“Mr. Trueworthy replied that if negligently, care- 
lessly, not purposely done, I should be only civilly 
liable for damages caused by my negligence; but if 


THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD. 


215 


it was wilfully done, there would be a further crim- 
inal liability for malicious injury to the property of 
the company. 

“ ‘You wouldn’t want me, sir,’ I asked, 'to do 
anything to lay myself liable?’ 

"But my employer turned to Mr. Trueworthy and 
said: 'You have been police-justice, and have had 
some experience in criminal law. I would like to 
have you look up the law carefully on that point, 
and we will see you again.’ ” 

Abrams paused; the district-attorney smiled. 
"Ah, they wanted to keep within the pale of the 
law, did they? To see about how much crime we 
can commit? Well, did you see your lawyer again, 
Mr. Abrams?” 

"Yes, sir, after a day or two the two managers 
of the Vacuum Oil Co. went with me again to 
Mr. Trueworthy,” continued Abrams. " 'Have you 
looked up that matter, Mr. Trueworthy?’ they 
asked. 

" 'Yes, I have looked it up,’ he answered. 

“ ‘What do you find out about it?’ 

" 'My impression has not changed. Such a course 
would involve him in a criminal liability if he did 
it on purpose. Everybody who advised or coun- 
selled him in such a course would be equally liable 
with him. The consequences, if you follow that 
course, would be that you would get into State’s 
prison. If he is an honest man he won’t think of 
taking any such action as that. I advise him to 
keep out of any such thing!’ 

"But the Vacuum people replied: ‘Such things 
will have to be found out before they can be pun- 
ished. They will have to find him before they 
can do anything to him.’ ” Again the witness 
paused. 

"Ah, they expected to get you out of the way, 


21 6 


GOD’S REBEL . 


did they?” said the district-attorney. “Well, what 
did your lawyer say to that idea?” 

Abrams replied squarely, and was then let off 
for a while. The millionaires breathed themselves 
for a moment and placed their heads together. 
Potiphar’s face was getting flushed; the thing was 
going too fast. They must manage to retard mat- 
ters. Time, which causes people to forget, and 
witnesses to die or take a trip or change their 
minds, must be summoned to their aid. 

The next witness was Abram’s former lawyer, 
Mr. Trueworthy, who corroborated to the very let- 
ter everything that had just been said. 

He was dismissed without cross-examination! 

The following day Kenneth was called, and gave 
his testimony regarding his relations with Abrams, 
and was finally questioned as an expert on purely 
economic and statistical points that had developed 
during the trial. 

His cross-examination was quite brief. “Is it 
true, Professor Moore,” asked Potiphar in his 
blandest manner, “that you once stated either pub- 
licly or otherwise, that men who conduct their 
business on the plan of a trust or monopoly, wheth- 
er in lands, coal, railroads, manufacturing, depart- 
ment-stores or other industry — that such men are 
no better than highwaymen and deserve to be 
treated as such by the public?” 

“I object!” shouted the district-attorney; “the 
question is incompetent, irrelevant, and imma- 
ter ” 

Kenneth signed to him. “Whether I ever said 
it or not,” he answered clearly, “I will confess that 
I am utterly unable to see the least difference.” 

“There!” cried Potiphar; “the intelligent jury 
will please note that this witness is wholly unsound 


THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD . 217 

— a most dangerous man to our free American in- 
stitutions!” 

That same afternoon Abrams again took the 
stand and continued his story. After the consulta- 
tion with his attorney at Rochester he had returned 
to Buffalo, to find his partner, Marks, greatly 
alarmed and mystified at his prolonged absence, 
as without his direction nothing could be done. 
But when one of the three stills of the refinery had 
been set up ready for use, the threats of the Vacu- 
um Company again overpowered him. He feared 
that all his money, the saving of a lifetime, was 
simply being sunk in this refinery, and he knew 
that the Vacuum had it in its power, if not through 
his aid then through some spy in its employ, to so 
thoroughly wreck or cripple his works as to ruin 
him outright or bankrupt him by delay. He had 
not been in the oil business all these years without 
being fully acquainted with the methods that the 
trust was in the habit of employing against its 
competitors. He regretted that he had been so 
foolish as to venture an independent business. Feel- 
ing in this mood, therefore, he took the only course 
open to him to save himself; the same course that, 
under the same pressure, ninety-nine business men 
out of a hundred might not scruple to adopt if 
constrained to save themselves. Various ways of 
accomplishing this, all well-known, all dishonest, 
and all alike equally indifferent to friends, part- 
ners, or those who have placed their confidence in 
them. And all are equally legitimate, equally neces- 
sary, equally beautiful, and equally symbolic of a 
state of social warfare. It is the same society, in fact, 
that many good people go to bed at night feeling 
gravely apprehensive over, lest its manifold beau- 
ties should be overthrown before they wake up in 
the morning. “There really are people in the 


GOD’S REBEL. 


218 

world, you know,” they ominously allege, “who 
intend actually to overthrow society!” 

Abrams, then, returned to Rochester, where he 
received his instructions from the Vacuum man- 
agers; thence back to Buffalo to be ready for the 
starting of the new refinery. “On that morning," 
said he, “I weighted down the safety-valve with 
heavy iron, and packed it with plaster of paris. I 
then said to the fireman: ‘Fire this still as heavy as 
you possibly can.’ ” 

The fireman complied with his directions; but 
during the forenoon Abrams went to him and 
shouted: “Fire this still! I want you to fire this 
still! Damn it! you ain’t got no fire under it!” And 
he took the shovel himself and threw more coal in, 
watching it till the fire-box grew cherry red. 

Where were the man’s eyes fixed at this moment? 
He had been through explosions before, knew what 
they meant. He had once carried a dark-lantern 
into the still-room when superintendent of the 
Vacuum, and was terribly burned by the explosion. 
Again he had seen four men burned; as one of 
them ran to get water with his clothes burning he 
had set fire to the gas. Flames flashed all about 
him, “There’s hell all around!” he cried. Another 
time he had seen an explosion from an overheated 
condensing pipe. The vapor of petroleum spread 
suddenly over everything; a flash, and men were 
shrieking and raving mad; their garments were 
flames; they leapt, they danced, and they sobbed; 
stalking pillars of fire in a lake of flame. At the 
hospitals, where the few that were saved had been 
taken, the flesh came off with their clothes in 
great chunks, and their eyes were cooked in their 
sockets. Such scenes were familiar. 

But Abrams was not thinking of this, but of the 
money which he hoped to receive. He, like many 


THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD . 2x9 

greater men, wished to be numbered among the 
iittest. He was simply putting his industrial com- 
petency to the proof. If the Vacuum people did it, 
and if the trust behind recommended it, it surely 
must be a legitimate business turn, which he, a 
humble workman, could not afford to despise. Of 
course he never would have been guilty of blowing 
open an express car out on the plains; that kind 
of thing was disreputable and several men had been 
caught and sent to jail for twenty years for such 
outrages against society. But to blow up a re- 
finery or a million dollar distillery was a compara- 
tively venial affair. Nobody, at least, had ever been 
punished for it, and probably never would be. 

By the end of the week it was evident which 
way the case was going. Abrams had told of his 
being spirited away, going first to Rochester, 
thence to New York and Boston, and finally to 
California. In all the years of his absence he re- 
ceived from the Vacuum Company over four thou- 
sand dollars for which he never did a stroke of work. 
Nor did the cross-examination serve to accomplish 
aught save to support the case of the State. The 
trustees, who sat there listening, grew grave and 
solemn. Early in the week the trial had been 
hugely enjoyed by them. The very idea that a 
great public enterprise such as theirs which rep- 
resented three hundred millions of dollars should 
concern itself over the affairs of a little competitor 
whose value was but fifteen thousand, was a fine 
piece of humour in itself. It reminded one of the 
trustees of that impudent tramp who had once 
scratched a match on the trustee’s brown-stone 
residence. He told the story: “Here, you impu- 
dent rascal,” said I, “you are spoiling my house. 
‘Beg pardon, guv’nor,’ said he, coolly lighting his 
pipe, ‘your house is spoiling my match.’ ” 


220 


GOD'S REBEL . 


But now matters were getting serious. What 
was to be done with that testimony of Trueworthy? 
Why hadn’t someone bought him — he surely had 
a price ! 

The president of the Saviour Oil Co. was placed 
on the stand. He was asked if his company was 
the light of the world, and he modestly said that 
it was. But when it came to the details of the 
business his ignorance was amazing. Still a Mes- 
siah isn’t supposed to be able to explain the mira- 
cle of his own creation. 

The room grew hot, reporters came in, glanced 
at the millionaires, and some of them sketched their 
pictures. What impudence! Just as though they 
were common criminals! One great fat mass lolled 
down in his chair, too tired to fan himself, his hand- 
kerchief over his features. Then he drew it off 
and puffed his cheeks out, in lieu of active exer- 
cise! As the testimony proceeded, he sank lower 
and lower in his chair; his turn-down collar was 
now level with his ears, and in another moment 
the crown of his bald head was completely swal- 
lowed by his shirt band — ’twas the veritable ring of 
Gyges; he was now invisible and could commit all 
evil with impunity! 

When the final argument- came Potiphar rose 
grandly to the occasion. He joked, he guyed and 
he sobbed; he made everyone feel good-natured. 
He proved conclusively by his own magnificent 
acting the superiority of the competitive system in 
jurisprudence and the advantage of law over jus- 
tice; coming finally to his peroration with a roar 
that you could hear all over Buffalo — 

“If this man,” he shouted, pointing to Abrams, 
“really did such a thing as to try to cause an ex- 
plosion of this refinery and at the risk of many 
precious lives, merely to save a paltry six thousand 


ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES. 


221 


dollars, why then, he deserved hanging — nay, 
lynching! Lynching, I say!” 

But when the district-attorney came back at him 
in due turn, asking, if his witness deserved hanging, 
then — his case being proved — what was the proper 
punishment for Potiphar, that worthy had fallen 
asleep. His work was done. Moreover the ques- 
tion was incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial. 

The jury came in with its verdict, regarding 
everyone whom the court had allowed them to 
try— 

“Guilty, as found in the indictment!” 


CHAPTER XIX. 

ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES. 

The result of the trial at Buffalo and the almost 
daily dissensions following left no room for anyone 
to doubt that the services of Professor Kenneth 
Moore of the Rockland University must shortly 
come to an end. Public opinion relative to the 
course he had taken was largely a matter of con- 
jecture; an occasional open-letter in some news- 
paper would now and then seem to discover that 
here and there someone agreed with him. Editor- 
ial expression, however, remained vague and in- 
clined to neutrality; the papers naturally would 
have liked to please their readers, but they must 
likewise please their stockholders; and unfortu- 
nately many of the latter were stockholders in the 
oil trust. The Republican , indeed, had no such 
scruples in regard to pleasing the public; it had 
hoodwinked the public so long that it felt no doubt 
of its ability to continue to do so. “A man like 


222 


GOD’S REBEL . 


Professor Moore, who has so long slandered our 
generous business-men and spoken with contempt 
of our industrial institutions, should be kicked out 
without ceremony/’ 

Naturally this sentiment gained ground among 
that large class of readers who let their newspapers 
do their thinking for them. Friends turned aside; 
even old Mr. Ludington looked at him askance. 
“Give it up, my lad; give it up!” But it was Mabel, 
manifestly, who took these slights the most to 
heart. In public she still treated it all with a care- 
less laugh; trampled with scorn his revilers, silenced 
them with hauteur. “She was proud of her hus- 
band; he was a man!” But in secret, kneeling be- 
fore that sovereign shrine of her chagrin, she would 
recant with passionate tears: Kenneth was a fool! 
he was cruel! he was wicked! Why could he not 
see whither the way was leading, and why did Uncle 
Edward encourage him when everyone else de- 
clared him to be wrong? 

Nor were the Erinnyes of their strained affec- 
tions one whit appeased when, a week or so later, 
he came to her with gladness in his face and elas- 
ticity in his step, and, placing his arm around her 
waist, said: “It is all right, Mabel. We shall 
not have to consider expenses. I have sold the 
house, and rented a cottage in Wildwood.” 

She was too astonished for anger. How could he 
affect to be jubilant over this deed! 

“Oh, Kenneth,” she cried wildly, “I can’t see 
why this should make you happy. To give up all 
that your father before you, after a life of con- 
stant toil and sacrifice, has been able to save, and 
— and” — yes she would fairly acknowledge it — 
“with the added sum of your own steady industry 
from the time you were a mere boy — is this a 
thing to be glad over?” 


ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES. 


223 


He was silent. It was the shipwreck on the 
bounding tide of his impetuous youth that gave him 
pause. Had he been sailing all these years to a 
compass whose hand was false to the magnet of 
the North? Beneath that narrow horizon wherein 
one solitary individual moves and is successful or 
defeated, he had hitherto scarcely paused to peer. 
One man was but the merest speck in the cosmic 
scheme, himself among the number, insignificant. 
That the mass of humanity could in general toil 
from century to century and have nothing to show 
for it in the end was a truism, with the reason for 
which and its every ignoble detail he was vibrant. 
In two minutes he could explain it to any- 
one who had the faintest glimmer of a desire for 
truth in his unawakened soul. He well knew 
that, so long as society persisted in conducting 
its industry on a false basis, the declaration in Prov- 
erbs: “Seest thou a man diligent in business? he 
shall be successful/’ was a hopeless, pitiable lie 
wherewith to confuse the ignorant and confiding. 
One man might toil a life time, become a million- 
aire, and yet go to his grave a pauper despite all 
his care, diligence and accumulated ability and ex- 
perience. Such instances were of everyday experi- 
ence, known to everyone; yet still the blundering 
world chose to declare that planless, hap-hazard, 
and warring industry of this sort was better than 
a regular, orderly and intelligent plan, and more- 
over that there could be no plan, forsooth, because 
there had never been any in the Past! 

But from the abstract his contemplation had now 
reached the concrete. He was becoming centered 
on his own ill-fortunes and those of his immediate 
acquaintances. After all, this was the great im- 
pelling force, this seeking to adapt oneself to one’s 
environment. A short time before, following 


224 


GOD’S REBEL, 


Spencer’s statement that “no thought, no idea, ever 
arises save as the result of a physical force,” he 
had said in his lecture-room: “We may readily 
understand that two hundred years ago the cour- 
tier with a brand new velvet cloak, a beautiful 
feather in his bonnet and a handful of crowns jing- 
ling cheerfully in his purse, thought precious little of 
the divine right of kings — or but to laud it. Not till 
the tea was taxed too high and the molasses fer- 
mented with the germ that lies in oppression, did 
our forefathers bestir themselves. Nor is it ever 
till the shoe begins to pinch good and hard, show- 
ing that it has become too small for the broad foot 
of humanity, that comes the hurt, that follows the 
idea.” 

From now on he gave up all outside work and 
confined himself closely to his study and class- 
room. Here he could honestly take pride. How 
it pleased him to find that the students were crowd- 
ing to hear him and that his lecture-room was 
growing too small! That the basil should blossom 
at last so luxuriantly in his own little flower-pot 
whose inhospitable soil had been nourished all these 
years — aye, for centuries! — with lies, hatred and 
the refuse of murder, was inexpressibly sweet to 
him and fraught with a boundless passion of hope 
and enthusiasm. The light kindled in his eye and 
his classes caught fire; whilst the sad lines that 
were beginning to trace their way across the earn- 
est young face relaxed and broke into a smile. 

On one morning when the spring sunshine was 
pouring into the room, lighting the expectant faces 
round him with a fresher glow, even as the life 
without was bursting into a newer, greener growth, 
he had chosen “Environment” as the topic of his 
lecture. 

“All force,” he began, “is contained in the en- 


ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES. 


22 5 


vironment. Even that potential energy which we 
now find residing in an organism, a people, or a na- 
tion, was once absorbed, abstracted, from the forces 
of the environment. Light, heat, gravity, pressure, 
food, these are forces close at hand and furnishing 
everyday proof; but no less are we indebted to 
those more distant forces, the swing of the planets, 
aye, even the gleam from a star so remote that, 
were its light to go out to-day, a thousand years 
must pass ere its force should finally cease to reach 
and affect us.” 

He then proceeded to show in a few concise 
statements how these forces had acted upon organ- 
isms in causing evolution; tracing the creature up- 
ward, and with a constant reference to the econo- 
mics of the ascent. “We thus see,” said he, “that 
the environment is constantly changing. Not a 
moment, not a breath, not a heartbeat, but that 
period is past forever. Gone are the light and the 
colour; gone the aim and the day; and gone at 
last the idea. All are creations of force, and all 
must change with the constantly changing forces 
of the environment. In the words of holy George 
Herbert — 

“ ‘Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright, 

The bridal of the earth and sky; 

The dews shall weep thy fall to-night, 

For thou must die. 

“ ‘Sweet rose, whose hue, angry and brave, 

Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye, 

Thy root is ever in the grave, 

And thou must die.’ 

“I should wish you to bear constantly in your 
minds this one fact, that everything everywhere 
changes, that nothing is immutable else there could 
be no growth; that there is only one law which 
never changes, and that is the Law of Change. 


226 


GOD’S REBEL . 


Knowing this you will not be apt to be deceived 
when you go out into life and run up against the 
first political speaker or half-bred attorney who at- 
tempts to tell you that human laws should be ac- 
cepted as being immutable and permanent in the 
face of all this change. He will doubtless cite you 
to our Constitution written in the light of one hun- 
dred years ago, saying: ‘Is it not as perfect to-day 
as then; does it not meet every requirement of 
this day?’ And you will laugh in his face, knowing 
well that such a thing as a written constitution, po- 
litical or religious, is contrary to every law of 
growth and development. The Constitution must 
be vested in the people themselves. 

“Even so you will laugh at the charge, ‘He is 
changeable; he never says to-day what he said 
yesterday, and all that he has just said to-day 
he will contradict to-morrow!’ After all, it is only 
fools prattling of their own folly who will charge 
you thus, who fail to understand that nothing is 
eternal save their own ignorance. Aye, let but the 
organism be impressionable, let him be true to 
himself, to his own soul, and I care not if he 
changes as the chameleon, for I am assured that his 
every change is but a higher expression of the truth 
that is in him. Whereas, show me a man who never 
changes, who prides himself upon his constancy, 
and I will show you a fool with less knowledge of 
God in his soul than the crumbling rocks along his 
highway. 

“For this reason,” he continued, T “because of the 
fact that all growth comes from without, any coup- 
ling of a purely coincidental institution with the 
word ‘progress’ is to me profoundly distasteful. 
For instance, ‘Progress and Christianity;’ Progress 
and Equality; Progress and Inequality; Progress 
and Slavery; and other meaningless associations, 


ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES. 


227 


presumptuous tails tacked on to that kite that soars 
eternally. For progress we always have — and al- 
ways shall have. It is inevitable so long as force 
persists. Hence we might with equal justice say 
‘Progress and Marbles/ or ‘Progress and Football/ 
as solemnly to repeat, ‘Progress and Christianity!’ 
No; growth is from God; not from man, nor his 
institutions; but in spite of them.” “f 

And when Kenneth said “God” none had a doubt 
of his meaning. Dr. Little had too frequently re- 
ferred to him as “that persuasive pantheist.” 

Yet there were those who declared that Professor 
Moore was a pessimist. 

He then went on to speak, from the standpoint 
of biology, of the difficulty attending the growth 
of a new idea. Beneath an environment where the 
forces acted constantly upon an individual in ap- 
parently the same direction day after day, that in- 
dividual would be slower to change than one on 
whom those forces had acted neither so long nor 
so regularly. This required no argument, as com- 
mon everyday experience had taught us. In biol- 
ogy, this long continuation of forces with but slight 
change was called repetition. By the effect of this 
repetition, the organism’s, the people’s — the na- 
tion’s habits, either in thought or action, tended to 
become fixed and to move only in a certain direc- 
tion. 

Wherever the effects of repetition had been felt 
the longest, at that point the organism, the individ- 
ual or the nation would be the slowest to change, 
to adopt a new idea. In nature, when the develop- 
ment of a creature was modified by a change in the 
forces of the environment, the change of forces 
would produce its effect first upon those parts 
which are the last to perfect their development. 
For instance, the lizard’s tail is the last organ to 


228 


GOD’S REBEL. 


lose its embryonic character. Now, the appear- 
ance of new characters always takes place at definite 
parts of the body, usually the posterior end, and 
during development with age passes forwards 
whilst still newer characters follow after from be- 
hind. This fact is recorded by definite marks on 
the animal’s body from the tip of its tail to its 
head. 

Pausing a moment for the force of his illustra- 
tion to go home, he added earnestly: 

“Gentlemen, always keep your eye on the tail of 
society; thence comes all growth, all impressions, 
all new ideas!” 

His class laughed and cheered. “The rag-tag 
and bob-tail !” 

It was merely a glimpse, a flash that illuminated 
for a moment the vast range of his subject, with its 
fulgent force that shot from the spark of the far- 
thest star to the soul of the humblest toiler in the 
field. 

A question was passed him on a slip of paper: 
“Did you read Professor Thurston’s article in the 
American magazine wherein he stated that all 
growth should come from the head?” 

Kenneth laughed. “Yes,” he replied, “I read it, 
and have merely to say that if the professor had re- 
membered but the faintest truth of biology he 
never would have made such a ridiculous mistake 
in this matter. For never, never under God’s hea- 
vens, does growth ever spring from the head! Pro- 
fessor Thurston, I regret to say, deprecated popu- 
lar education; stated that there should be an aris- 
tocracy of learning — if anyone can imagine such a 
thing — and that education was designed by God 
for the few and not for the many. Moreover, he 
deprecated all these ‘popular’ movements and up- 
risings in the West, instead of regarding such as 


ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES. 


229 

signs. He called us all fools and cranks; he wanted 
the lizard’s tail to stop its lashing — the head was 
well enough satisfied, there was plenty to eat where 
it lay! But the tail can’t be quiet; under the stimu- 
lus of a changing and changed environment it is 
lashing itself into a fury all over the West. It only 
remains to be seen whether the head will finally 
accept these protests, or continue to regard its own 
tail as a freak.” 

Other questions followed, from all sides; for a 
space of five or ten minutes he stood there answer- 
ing them with a word that suggested. It was near- 
ing the close of his term, or, for aught he knew, of 
his life; the stimulus that he found and required in 
work with his class was to end with a day in June; 
he felt it; his students felt it; they would not let 
him go. 

He read the question: “What is the chief cause 
of the changes in the forces of the environment in 
the West?” 

“Why, most assuredly,” he answered, “ ’tis the 
land. The absence of land or its ownership in great 
tracts by a few, is driving the people pell-mell back 
into the congested centers of population. Some 
thirty years ago Bagehot observed: Tt is strange 
to think how different would have been the fate of 
this and of coming generations if America and 
Australia had possessed imperfect but thickly pop- 
ulated civilizations like those of China and India.’ 
It would be interesting to know what Mr. Bagehot 
would think of the fate of the present generation 
to-day, with all of this land now beyond the reach 
of the masses. This question is practically agreed 
on, the only trouble is the solution. Shall the 
robbed take back their own?” 

Other students were beginning to crowd into the 
room, young men in shiny black clothes, lean bod- 


GOD’S REBEL. 


230 

ies, pinched faces covered with a downy growth, 
and with a hungry look in their eyes. They be- 
longed to the theological department, and all hoped 
soon to have a permanent position where they 
could earn their bread and butter in the alleged 
service of the Master. They stood there listening 
to Kenneth’s last words: 

“Let your observations be wide and your induc- 
tions will be true,” he was saying. “Base your 
economics broadly on the fundamental principles 
of biology, and you will cease to expect anything 
but a curse to follow a system that makes charity 
and philanthropy appear noble, penuriousness a vir- 
tue, and lying a necessity. Give over your prej- 
udices to the past; anticipate the agrarian An- 
taeus, and with every fresh step you will find new 
strength. Learn to love life better than the grave, 
and to dare accept it at its full. It was meant for 
us. Man alone of all God’s creatures can collect- 
ively rise superior to his environment and shape 
its forces to his requirements — not permitting it 
to damn him and his kind forevermore. Nor will 
the alms-giving Buddhist ever right these wrongs, 
neither the crazy Christian with his creeds and su- 
perstitions. No, the Star of the East has set for- 
ever after humanity has been driven to the borders 
of the Western sea. It has now turned back; it is 
on the march. Some of you will lend a hand; some 
of you will lead it upward; and some of you, I 
trust, I hope, will be among the chosen to cross the 
Bifrost and to dwell with Woden in Valhalla.” ? 

Again his class cheered him to the echo as he 
bowed. He was leaving hastily when a hand was 
laid on his shoulder, and turning, he discovered 
Dr. Little. 

“Ah, professor,” said he, shaking his head; “it 
won’t do; I can’t have my divinity students dwell- 


ENVIRONMENTAL FORCES. 


231 


ing in Valhalla, you know. However” — and he 
laughed — “I must say that you spoke only the 
truth. The church has acted shamefully and must 
be taught to look upon humanity from the stand- 
point of economics. But you know how it is, pro- 
fessor — you know we can’t do anything. We can’t 
speak as we believe and feel! But ah,” and the 
president laid his hand on Kenneth’s shoulder, 
“when I hear you speak sometimes it makes me 
fairly envious of your age, your fearlessness, your 
independence! You, at least, can do whatever you 
please and know to be right. A most fortunate 
position, Professor Moore — a most fortunate one!” 

Was he joking or serious? After having already 
given him warning that his services should not be 
required another year, could the president who 
drew a ten thousand dollar salary really be envious 
of one who was shortly to be turned adrift without 
means, without promise, almost without hope? 

He passed out, and crossed the quadrangle. A 
street musician, an old man with long white hair, 
and face that peered yearningly into his own as 
he came up was grinding out the Marseillaise. 
How forlorn it sounded at that time and place! 
Almost as the echo of his own futile words. He 
paused. Ah, it was the same old fellow who had 
piped so merrily for them last winter — Spanish 
Pete. 

He handed him a quarter. “Come and see me 
some time,” he said kindly. 

The old man removed his hat, his face beamed: 
(( Gracias, senor.” That bow might have graced a 
minuet — perhaps even it had. 

Kenneth walked on slowly. Are men, after all, 
so much better than the institutions they repre- 
sent? he found himself asking. He may have been 
thinking of the university or the hand-organ, the 


232 


GOD’S REBEL . 


president or Spanish Pete. The institution did not 
matter in dealing with a query of this kind. Poor 
old Prexy! he laughed softly; he is well tipped for 
his music, yet he feels the pressure and bows with 
servility to the self-same master that rules the or- 
gan-grinder. On the whole, I prefer and honour 
the latter. He at least pretends to no more than he 
is. There’s no affectation of religion about him. 


CHAPTER XX. 

MOMENTOUS OCCASIONS. 

When the time came for giving up their home 
and moving to Wildwood, Nannette had forsaken 
them and gone to live with Mrs. Phillips. I should 
only be a nuisance, Mabel,” she had said; “your 
work will be so much lighter without ‘the boarder/ 
don’t you think so ?” Though Mabel had answered 
candidly that, if she meant housework, she didn’t 
propose to bother herself with that. Still, she had 
preferred not to urge her. 

After establishing themselves in their new home, 
therefore, Mabel had directly fallen into the way of 
being absent the greater part of the day and well 
on into the evening; but which occasioned little 
comment from her husband, as he knew her to be 
absorbed in her music and the various social and 
charitable demands that were unavoidable with her 
rising popularity as a singer. And in truth he had 
admired her the more for this very independence; 
so much, indeed, as to congratulate her, once, but 
to his immediate regret. For she had resented it, 
briefly, strangely — or so it seemed to him; with 


MOMENTOUS OCCASIONS. 


233 

sundry implications, pantomimic yet cutting, none 
too pleasant for a man in his position to recall. 

They now lived so far out that few of their old 
friends came to see them, save for Nannette and 
Enid, accompanied on occasion by the O. G. Gold- 
smith-Smith Publishing Co. Sometimes they drove, 
but more frequently came on wheels, in obedience 
to the whims and commands of Nannette. 

“By Jove!” Oliver had said to Kent, “it’s a bad 
thing for us, the summer coming on so soon. She 
won’t have any copy for us now till next winter. 
You’ll see.” Accordingly he had set to work to 
try and make the best of a bad matter, spending as 
many of his evenings at Mrs. Phillips, as he could 
well spare. “Yes, I quite agree with you, Miss 
Nielsen, it is really too warm for literary work, you 
know.” 

And entering his office late in the afternoon one 
day at this period, he had ordered: “Sam, I wish 
you would write to some of those famous individ- 
uals whose manuscripts are piled up over there and 
tell them frankly that we really cannot use matter 
of that kind. Thank them for their courtesy, of 
course, and tell them that we appreciate the fact 
of there being something 'ominously flattering’ — as 
Whistler has it — in this — er, occasion of their sub- 
mitting to us, a young Western publishing-house, 
these latest products of their pens, these ripest clus- 
ters plucked from the vines of Parnassus whilst 
standing with hands up-stretched on the peaks of 
their towering Egos. But that, in consideration 
of our readers, we have made it an invariable rule 
not to publish anything more that is not of some 
discoverable human interest. Therefore, whilst the 
conversation and happenings of snobs in London 
and New York, Rudolphs in Ruritania, and of 
elephants and tigers in India, may possibly be of 


234 


GOD’S REBEL . 


interest in some parts of the world, we must re- 
peat that in the midst of our stirring life and as a 
mere question of geography if not of literature, 
we regret to find their manuscripts unavailable.” 

Sam smiled and wrote on. “ I’m afraid, 
Oliver,” he returned, “that you are beginning to 
draw the lines a little too close, aren’t you? Some 
of those authors will declare you are becoming a 
pessimist — I believe that’s what they call a man 
nowadays who wants things better.” 

“Well, it makes no difference; we’re through 
with that kind of stuff; if they think they can 
crowd that effete material through our press at this 
stage of the game, why — But by Jove, old man! 
when I think of how near we came to going to 
pieces it just makes me wake up in the night and 
shudder. For honestly, you know, at the start we 
really had no more chance for success than those 
thousands of other small publishing firms whose 
sole capital consists of an unlimited stock of preda- 
tory politeness and a well-oiled typewriter. It’s all 
your work, Sam; I shall never forget it. By the 
way, I read that article of Moore’s in the Sun on 
‘Environmental Forces in Literature.’ It was great; 
I quite agree with him. What a queer chap he is 
for biology ! Goes back to the beginning and traces 
down our every instinct. When a lover kisses his 
sweetheart, he avers, it is merely the old, old effort 
of the moner to swallow his mate. Fla! that’s 
rich ! though I used to think with Keats : ‘Do not 
all charms fly at the mere touch of cold philos- 
ophy ?’ ” 

Which would indicate that Oliver also had be- 
come somewhat infested with the views of Professor 
Moore, and in consequence of which the business 
of the O. G. Goldsmith-Smith Publishing Co. had 
been amazing some of the other houses. Beginning 


MOMENTOUS OCCASIONS. 


235 


with the Desert Isle , other new writers had appeared 
and set the fresher impress of their lives against 
that artful dodger of our day and generation — the 
writer with a name. The result had left no room 
for further misgivings. 

“Now I’ll just tell you what it is, old man,” 
Oliver continued oracularly, “when an author has 
once written a true book, a book that has fully 
reflected himself up to the moment of going to 
press, then he has done his work and would better 
keep silent; for several years, at least, or until 
something happens to him.” 

“A good idea, Oliver; but do you really think 
anything ever will happen to them?” Sam asked, 
in accents of profound hopelessness. 

“Humph! the Lord knows — some of them. 
Fancy anything ever happening to this author!” 
He held up a manuscript he was in the process of 
wrapping. “But if some of these fellows, who per- 
sist in writing half a dozen novels a year ” He 

bit the end of his cigar savagely. 

“Yes, I know,” Sam sighed, “only don’t take it 
to heart so; they are quite irrepressible.” He in- 
serted an unavailable slip and wrapped up a manu- 
script on his desk. “I presume this man will be 
surprised at our impudence.” 

“Who is it?” 

“Oh, it’s that — Sh! I’ll whisper it to you in the 
elevator. Somebody might have a phonograph in 
our key-hole, you know.” 

Oliver laughed, stepping over and glancing at 
the address. “Ah, yes, I read it. Now isn’t that 
awful, awful! Why, it’s nothing less than a case 
of mental and moral suicide, and not satisfied with 
that he sends the infant here to us pretending it to 
be viable and attempts to get our money under 
false pretences.” 


236 


GOD’S REBEL. 


“Yes, the man certainly ought to get six months 
hard,” and Sam drew the string taut and tied the 
knot very tight. “One of the most atrocious crim- 
inals of the age.” 

“Oliver whistled softly a fragment of that pop- 
ular song, “And There Are Others,” and contin- 
ued: “However, we’re doing a noble work for hu- 
manity. We’re doing our best to give them a 
decent burial and bringing worthier men to the 
light as fast as possible. But pshaw! what’s the 
use? Now this one, it’s called The Week's Work , 
will go right straight over to McBugle and Dunn’s 
and Colonel Slauson will blow his trumpet and 
declare it to be the very best work of its author 
and one of the greatest masterpieces of the age. 
Confound him! I think a term would do him good, 
too.” 

He cleaned up the correspondence on his desk, 
picked up his coat and hat, and with a commenda- 
tory “Keep at it, old man; I’m going over to the 
printer’s — back in about an hour,” he hurried out. 

And the “old man” kept at it. A dozen more 
manuscripts were wrapped and tied, a letter writ- 
ten to their respective authors in that beautiful 
rounded hand of his, couched in terms appropri- 
ate only to select readers, and which all who saw 
them agreed that the O. G. Goldsmith-Smith Pub- 
lishing Co. was wholly unique and peculiar — 
“Damn peculiar,” some even asseverated. 

In the midst of his pleasant and sacred occupa- 
tion he was interrupted by the rustle of skirts and 
a draught of cold air. “Ah, Mrs. Phillips — Miss 
Nielsen,” he cried cordially, as he rose and took 
their hands; “delighted to see you, only please do 
come away from that desk. I’ve been sitting there 
all day. Here, take these seats.” 

“Ah, but I thought you never left it any more, 


MOMENTOUS OCCASIONS . 


237 


Mr. Kent,” said Enid, as they sat in the window 
whence they could look far out over the tops of 
the city and the lake beyond. “We’ve scarcely 
seen you for a month past.” 

He explained; he had been unusually busy — the 
summer trade. 

“But where’s Mr. Goldsmith-Smith?” she asked. 

“Oh, yes, where’s Oliver? I want to see him,” 
echoed Nannette. 

Ah, was she learning to call him already by that 
most familiar and tenderest of his varied names? 
It seemed so, and somehow it gave him a peculiar 
and most unusual sensation, reminding him forcibly 
of the way he had felt one night several weeks ago 
when coming away from a call on Nannette, and 
Oliver had confessed to him suddenly as the door 
shut behind: “Hang it all, Sam, I believe I’m in 
love.” Whereat Sam had caught his breath sharply 
and replied vaguely: “Oh, is that all? Well, I — 
I’d be quite sure of it, Oliver, if I were you.” 
Afterwards he had been very busy. 

“He’s gone over to the printer’s,” Sam replied. 
“I think he’ll be back shortly if nothing — er — hap- 
pens to him; if he doesn’t get caught in the ma- 
chinery.” 

He looked at Nannette. She did not appear to 
be greatly alarmed. 

“Oh dear, how provoking!” said she. 

“Yes, so it would, so it would,” he admitted. 

Enid laughed. Was he never to confess- himself, 
she wondered. 

“Oh, of course I don’t mean that,” Nannette 
objected. “But I wanted to see him — I called on 
business.” 

Sam was amazed, but incredulous. He knew 
she hadn’t been doing any work lately, or at least 
not to his knowledge. He scanned her closely; a 


238 


GOD’S REBEL. 


pretty parable in cream, jet stars, and red edges, 
an edition de luxe . How one edition of her just 
as she stood would take for the summer season! 

“In that case/’ he suggested, “if it is a matter of 
business, perhaps — or no, I forgot.” 

“Forgot! Why, what do you mean?” 

He refused to explain. “We’ve made a new rule,” 
said he, “and I don’t think I can help you.” 

“O dear! You are always making new rules, 
Mr. Kent, and you know you could help me so 
much if you would,” she persisted. “The only rea- 
son I didn’t speak to you was because I didn’t dare ; 
you are so severe in your judgment.” 

Hm! She had come there then intending to 
hoodwink Oliver. It was fortunate the young man 
was out. 

“My dear — er ” 

She smiled. 

“Young woman!” he ended severely. “If you 
knew what sacred duty I was engaged in when you 
entered you wouldn’t think of submitting any more 
of your work to us.” 

“But what on earth have I done,” she cried — 
“No, what under heavens were vou doing, Mr. 
Kent?” 

He replied ruthlessly — might as well have it over 
with. “You see those manuscripts on my desk over 
there?” he demanded. 

She turned, glanced, and nodded her head; 
saucily, however; ’twas an old trick — they could 
not fool her that way again. 

“Young woman! Every one of them is the latest 
work of distinguished authors at home and in Eng- 
land. They are all refused.” 

“My goodness! Are you going out of business, 
Mr. Kent?” 

Enid gasped. It was dazzling, bold, but benefi- 


MOMENTOUS OCCASIONS. 


239 


cent. A little over a year ago, she remembered, 
they had been begging for manuscripts from those 
individuals, and now they were found unavailable. 
Being privileged, she glanced at the addresses, and 
laughed immoderately. 

“No, we are not goingout of business, Miss Niel- 
sen,” Sam condescended, “but Mr. Goldsmith- 
Smith has lately found that when an author has 
once become famous,” — and he explained to her 
in detail. “There is no help for you until some- 
thing happens to you.” 

“Oh, what nonsense! Mr. Kent.” She was not 
lightly subdued. “Why, you can’t imagine how 
much has happened to me in a year.” 

“Oh yes I can,” Sam admitted mournfully, “I 
have no doubt a great deal has happened, but it 
might not be interesting.” And reflecting a mo- 
ment, he added: “Besides, it is merely conven- 
tional.” 

Was he speaking seriously; was he taking this 
way of admonishing her that she had not been 
true to herself and her art? With a moue that 
mocked whilst beseeching, her glance fell. 

“I am sorry,” she said simply; “it has all been 
so fresh and inviting — here. But I am sorry I 
have disappointed you.” 

About a week later Oliver came into the office 
and after opening his desk, he remarked: “Sam, I 
saw Miss Nielsen last night.” 

“Did you? That was nice,” Sam agreed. 

“Yes, oh yes. But, I say, old man, you broke 
her all up. She says you refused to publish any 
more of her work.” 

“Oh, no, I’m afraid she misunderstood me. I 
merely explained our new rule.” 

“Of course. But hang it all, Sam, you know 
there are exceptions to 


240 


GOD'S REBEL . 


“Oliver/’ said Sam solemnly, “Oliver, so long 
as the critic’s eye is lucent and not jaundiced with 
sentiment the rules of art can have no exceptions. 
It is the brain, the God-like organ, that sees clearly 
at all times save when the sickly sentiment of the 
heart overcasts its vision. Look! As we gaze 
through the bare trees in November it needs little 
to warn us that winter has begun, despite the co- 
quetting pleasureless sunshine.” 

Smith started. What in the devil did he mean? 
However, he objected. 

“Oh, I say now, Sam, don’t be an idiot. You 
know you sat up too late last night at Mrs. Brady’s 
and I tell you that jaundices the eye, too, quite as 
much as anything else. I don’t know what’s come 
over you — you’ve been going all to pieces lately, 
and it’s all because you don’t go out enough. Quit 
it, Sam, quit it! Confound it all, you’re losing part 
of your life — you’re getting old!” 

Sam stopped work and looked up. “Yes,” he 
admitted slowly, running his hand through his 
hair, “that’s so, Oliver, and I suppose I do begin 
to look pretty ancient and ” 

“Oh, shut up, Sam! you know I didn’t mean 
that, quite. No one would ever take you to be 
more than ” he stopped suddenly. 

Sam besought him to say the worst. 

“Well, I was only going to say that no one — no 
one who knows you, you know — would take you to 
be — well, twenty-five.” 

Sam smiled. “No, I suppose not.” It was cer- 
tainly very courteous in Oliver to put it that way. 
No man of his position wanted to be mistaken for 
a kid of twenty-five. It would ruin the circulation 
of the Sun — cause a spot to cool in its center. And 
yet — there might still be times when that age would 
be very convenient and attractive. Having contin- 


MOMENTOUS OCCASIONS. 


241 


ued to go in society year after year only to find 
that there was absolutely no variety, now when all 
women were ceasing to look quite alike to him, he 
was getting old. 

“You think, then, Oliver,” he began gropingly, 
“that if I ohly take care of myself awhile I might 
pass for ” 

“Oh, yes; don’t speak of that! Don’t I always 
see that your coat fits you and your ties are cor- 
rect?” 

What more could even Methuselah want ! Under 
the generous tutelage of Mr. Goldsmith-Smith he 
was good for a thousand years at the least. Sam 
had seen men of that kind in the clubs; of any 
age, sixty, eighty, one-hundred, blase and suave 
as a mummy, moving serene amid the alien young- 
lings. 

O glorious vista, with its perennial I came, I saw, 
and I conquered! he sighed, softly. 

“But now look here,” cried Oliver, again com- 
ing to the attack, “she wants to publish another 
book, you know.” 

“Yes, I believe she said so, Oliver.” 

“Well, you needn’t have acted that way about it. 
A person should show a little deference, a little 
discretion, when dealing with a — well, with a 
genius. She isn’t subject to our rules, quite. Be- 
sides it’s not a recent work but an old one.” 

Sam subsided. “Humph! there might be some 
chance for that,” he admitted reflectively, “I pre- 
sume it was written before the Desert Isle , then? 
Well, tell her to send it in and I’ll read it.” 

Oliver came over, put his hand on Sam’s shoul- 
der and said solemnly: “Sam, don’t be a fool! Can’t 
you ever see through anything? Why, you’ve read 
it already. IBs the Rhapsodist, man! The Rhab- 
s odist!” 

16 


242 


GOD’S REBEL . 


'The devil! — But you don’t mean it, Oliver? 
Now stop acting that way and be sensible. Why 
didn’t she tell me?” 

"Tell you!” cried Oliver indignantly. "Why, 
you never gave her a chance — you just came right 
out flat-footed and declared that hereafter she was 
laid on the shelf. But that’s always the way with 
men of your profession; you get too narrow and — 
well, confoundedly obtuse! However, she’s the au- 
thor of The Rhapsodist , and is going to revise and 
publish it again. By the way, she explained why 
she didn’t first come to us with the Desert Isle 
— before going everywhere else. She felt, some- 
how, that we hadn’t done right with her first book. 
It’s strange how an author will feel that way, isn’t 
it?” 

Sam paced up and down, lost in meditation and 
surprise, wondering how the similarity could have 
escaped him. Yet her first story was written with 
a pen — and he had felt sure it was a woman’s 
hand from the first — whilst her later story was type- 
written, sexless and impersonal, and between these 
two styles of manuscripts there is such a vast dif- 
ference as to confuse the ablest of readers and sug- 
gest no sign of a sisterhood; this is read in whole 
pages, at a glance; whilst that is studied in blots, 
and/ dashes, and curses — Silurian traces, persistent 
and elusive, in the very face of our modern civiliza- 
tion. Some day, when poverty had ceased to make 
savages of us all, the O. G. Goldsmith-Smith Pub- 
lishing Co. was going to give typewriters to all its 
authors — or rather, as a premium to all who would 
promise to write a book not oftener than once in 
two years. 

"Did you hear what I said, Sam? She’s going to 
revise it.” 

He paused, "Oh, no; don’t let her do that. It’s 


MOMENTOUS OCCASIONS. 


243 . 

perfect just as it stands — it would be only a waste 
of her time and our money in new plates. All it 
needs to make it go like one of — I mean like any 
celebrated author’s work, is simply to put her name 
on it.” 

“Yes, I told her that,” Oliver answered ingenu- 
ously, “but she wants to change it.” 

“Pshaw! don’t let her, Oliver, I love that book. 
Don’t let her spoil it.” 

“Well, then, go and see her about it yourself, 
Sam. I can’t do anything with her, although I 
was just like that — didn’t want it changed, you 
know. But what in the devil can I do? She won’t 
come here, and you won’t go there, and she’s 
dead set on that plan of hers of changing the plot 
— marrying off the ‘rhapsodist.’ ” 

“Marrying him? Good heavens!” 

“Yes, that’s right,” Oliver agreed. “Isn’t she 
crazy? Now who would ever think of such a 
thing?” 

Alas, Sam thought of it! It haunted him the 
rest of that day and went home to Mrs. Brady’s 
with him at night, and many nights thereafter. 
For by what strange divination had this girl out 
on an Iowa farm stolen the secret of his solitude, 
taken the bare warp of his life and woven into it 
the woof of her own golden spinning until even to 
himself, as he sat in his chair turning the panoramic 
pages, it was as though he lived again that decade, 
read the dreamer in the dreamed. Yet she thought 
to improve things, he mused whilst his lamp burned 
low, if she married the rhapsodist. Strange she 
should think of that! And as for Oliver, he had 
confessed it would spoil it — and he loves her. Ah, 
one knew it would be that way, could tell it from 
the first. Oliver was young yet; yes, Oliver was 
quite young; but he was improving, and his pros- 
pects — well, his prospects were certainly splendid. 


244 


GOD'S REBEL. 


CHAPTER XXI. 

THE STRIKE A T WHEELING. 

It was the middle of June, and Kenneth’s lec- 
tures at the university were coming to a close; 
this, moreover, without any position in sight for the 
coming year. The fact worried him more than 
he would confess. Once indeed he had gone 
to Mr. Ludington to ask if there was not some 
business in which the old gentleman’s influence 
would serve to obtain him a position. “I want 
no more school-teaching,” he had declared, “in 
schools that are controlled by private capital. I 
should prefer to be a clerk, anything, at which I 
can derive a mere living till I can get a book or 
two written and published.” But the old gentle- 
man had shaken his head unfavourably; all his 
money at present, he explained, was invested in 
banking. “I — I really don’t fancy you would like 
that work, would you, Kenneth?” 

“Oh, well, Uncle Amos; it’s as honest as any- 
thing nowadays, I suppose. I really can’t blame 
a man for taking usury — in this year of our Lord.” 

Mr. Ludington smiled. “Well, if you wish, later, 
perhaps, I will give you letters to some of the 
banks.” And as Kenneth went away he murmured : 
“Poor lad! we’re all thieves and rogues in his sight. 
Surely, a strange monomania !” 

Meanwhile the troubles at Wheeling were grow- 
ing more threatening as the warm weather came on, 
and the workmen need fear no longer the inclem- 
ency of nature added to that of man. In a few 
of the churches throughout the city the condition of 
the workmen at Wheeling became the subject of 


THE STRIKE A T WHEELING. 245 

frequent condemnation; some pastors, indeed, lost 
their pulpits in consequence. Rich men who sup- 
ported churches, and owned stock in the Wheeling 
Co. and similar institutions, quite naturally object- 
ed to being referred to from the pulpit as a set of 
social banditti. This wasn’t what the church was 
for! Let the preacher dilate on the horrors of im- 
providence, ignorance, drunkenness, christianised 
by the blessings of charity and philanthropy and 
sanctified with the time-honoured law, “The poor 
ye have always with you!” This was the kind of 
preacher they supposed they had hired. Yet in one 
such church, gifted with a too-intelligent pastor, 
Kenneth had one night been asked to speak on 
the so-called profound labour problem at Wheel- 
ing; and being in his usual vein, his words doubt- 
less implied added discomfort to the already well- 
nigh intolerable club-life of President Little. 

That same night as he reached home Mabel 
handed him a telegram. He noticed carelessly that 
she had already opened it. “Has it been waiting 
long?” he asked, reading it quietly. 

“About two hours, I should think.” 

“And you read it — you know what it is? Really, 
Mabel, I should think you might have ” 

“But you won’t go, will you?” she cried con- 
temptuously. 

“Certainly. It’s from Holden. ‘Come to Wheel- 
ing at once. Men determined to go out.’ Good- 
by. I shall catch the eleven o’clock train.” 

“Wait! O Kenneth! I think it’s simply disgrace- 
ful!” 

“What do you mean?” he asked. 

“This,” she cried, “this strike! Your meddling 
with the affairs of those men. Why, you never 
seem to think of me — how unpleasant it makes it 


246 


GOD'S REBEL . 


everywhere. I do wish you would give it up, once 
for all!” 

He glanced at his watch; he had ten minutes to 
catch his train. “Do you mean, Mabel, that peo- 
ple don’t treat you well?” 

“No; they don’t. I can’t begin to tell you how 
mean and disagreeable some people can be! I tell 
you I am thoroughly sick of it all. I can’t stand 
it!” 

He stood a moment, thoughtfully, scarce know- 
ing how to reply. “Yes, I know — I know,” he be- 
gan vaguely; “I can realise that it has been un- 
comfortable for you. Women, who derive an ob- 
vious pleasure from torturing their kind, find de- 
light in hurting you for something I may have said 
affecting their husbands’ inordinate greed and am- 
bition. Such work necessarily has its unpleasant 
features; I do not enjoy its ostracism, Mabel, any 
more than you ” 

“But it wouldn’t be so bad, Kenneth, at least I 
shouldn’t feel it so,” she broke in, “if the people 
whose interests you are working for were our own 
kind; but they are not, you know they are not! 
On the contrary you are fighting against your very 
best friends, life-long acquaintances; and all in 
favour of a lot of ignorant working-men, tramps, 
men wholly unable to appreciate you and that may 
any moment turn against you. Don’t you see what 
folly it is?” 

He smiled sadly, whereat she flushed angrily and 
turned away: “Oh, that’s always the way you take 
it! I often think you care more for those men 
than for me.” 

“No, no; I beg your pardon, Mabel,” he pro- 
tested; “your argument struck me — involved a 
principle in biology, class against class, you see. 
Still” — and again he glanced at his watch hurried- 


THE STRIKE AT WHEELING. 


247 


ly, “my heart is all with that class, whether they be 
our own kind or not. I hate an aristocratic thief!” 

She deigned no reply. Seating herself at the 
piano she began to prelude a familiar German bal- 
lad. Somewhat of passionate resentment in its 
tones surprised him, moved him strangely beyond 
its wont. Pausing a moment, he came over to 
where she sat and touched her lightlv on the shoul- 
der. 

“Mabel, I must go. Won’t you say good-by?” 

A note more of love might have conquered them 
both. Why was it not forthcoming? 

Her eyelids drooped slightly — that was all. The 
passionate prelude rolled on. It might have been 
the echo of her heart. 

Stooping, he kissed her on the forehead, and 
hastened out. 

The town of Wheeling was aglow with electric 
light as he stepped off the train; streets were quiet 
and deserted, the hand of the town clock in 
the main factory building pointing a quarter past 
the hour of eleven. What a palace of industry it 
was! Surely, if Mr. Wheeling had done nothing 
else he at least deserved the thanks of the world for 
showing that manufacturing enterprise need not 
necessarily be confined to districts whose outward 
squalor offends the senses. The wand of Circe was 
no less potent to-day than in the past; confine work- 
men within miserable sties and the environment 
soon completed the mental and physical degene- 
racy. To this extent the town was a wonderful ad- 
vance, a brilliant illustration; but ah, even here 
something had gone wrong, had been overlooked 
in the plans and specifications. The city clergy 
maintained that “it was merely another instance of 
total depravity in man;” the Republican, “the work 


248 


GOD'S REBEL . 


of demagogues;” the average college professor, 
“the effect of too much education among the mass- 
es.” “Is not this a most lamentable thing that the 
skin of an innocent lamb should be made parch- 
ment? that parchment being scribbled o’er, should 
undo a man?” 

But what was the worm in the bud? Merely 
this: “If you put a chain around the neck of a 
slave, the other end fastens itself around your own. 
Bad counsel confounds the adviser.” Both chain 
and advice in this case were plainly the unbridled 
profit-system. No system of robbery had yet been 
discovered that could be considered truly benefi- 
cent, however polite or suave be the robber, or 
whatever the price rebated to his own soul and his 
church pew. 

Proceeding straight to Holden’s residence, Ken- 
neth waited but a second for the doctor to step into 
his coat and together they were off to the town- 
hall where the workmen were holding a mass 
meeting. “It’s come at last,” the doctor observed 
grimly as they walked along. “Some nine or ten 
families were evicted this evening because they 
couldn’t pay their rent. There’s that man Harvey, 
for instance — you remember him; he paid four- 
teen dollars and a half rent, seventy-nine cents for 
water, and had left only seventy-one cents a day 
on which to feed and clothe himself, wife, and four 
children. Last fall his wages were cut, his child was 
taken sick and he ran behind in his rent. To-night 
his family is out on the sidewalk.” 

“Platitudes, doctor, mere platitudes; the world 
has heard the like these thousands of years. I tell 
you our cause has nothing to gain and everything 
to lose by invoking pity rather than justice.” 

“Yes, yes; you’re right, of course. But my God! 
a man can’t stand everything. His love for his 


THE STRIKE AT WHEELING. 


249 


kind, his offspring, is as strong as ever. The 
workingman hasn't got beyond sentiment, even if 
the heartless world has.” 

And the doctor spoke truly, for as they entered 
the hall it required but a glance to catch the argu- 
ment of the evening. Long hours, cut in wages, 
nine millions of profits for the company last year 
and our families starving to death. A man was 
speaking from a platform: “Look round you,” he 
said, “and lo! the farmers are destroying their crops, 
the manufacturer cannot sell his clothing, his shoes; 
the capitalists tell us there's an overproduction, 
and we, who help to produce all this wealth for 
others, are in want of the barest necessities. We 
are starving, they tell us, because there is too 
much!” 

(A flood in China destroyed five thousand peo- 
ple, — yesterday, the day before, 'tis no matter; we 
read about it in the morning paper with like in- 
terest. Let the floods continue; there is no lack 
of Chinamen!) 

The speaker continued; the note of Moses was 
on his lips and he was addressing the children of 
Israel; the Philistines were in front, and behind 
them stood the periphrastic Pharaoh. All the first- 
born were to be murdered — and the second-born, 
too, for that matter. Naught was said of the Red 
Sea, the vast army of unemployed lying in wait for 
their positions the moment they walked out — God 
would be on hand to take care of the Red Sea 
after they got to it. Only break their fetters, loosen 
their thongs, everlastingly quit making bricks with- 
out straw. “We’ll teach them that the slave is 
equal to his master, that labour is not a commodity, 
that human life is to be considered above profits; 
there is justice and sympathy for us in the hearts of 
the masses. Therefore: ‘Strike! Strike! Strike!’” 


GOD'S REBEL. 


250 

The cry was taken up, swept out of the room; a 
warm blast on the cold without, clamorous of the 
revolt in hell — and as futile. 

Others spoke in the same strain; the time sped; 
more harrowing incidents of slavery and starvation 
were dragged forth. Some of the Chinamen 
drowned in the flood were even identified, it is 
claimed! 

But on one thing their unanimity was vociferous, 
calling on high heaven to bear witness; namely, 
there was to be no violence. 

Oh, no; no violence; they were only going to 
strike. They were going to strike in order to bring 
their employers to their knees. If necessary to win 
their cause they were going to starve to death like 
gentlemen, peaceably, contentedly, and decently, 
within their own houses, sending proper notification 
to the undertaker and ordering a respectable but 
inexpensive funeral, thus saving the Wheeling 
Company any needless expense and worry over a 
coroner’s inquest. Their magnanimity over minor 
details was amazing, altitudinous. It is the way 
with grand souls. Surely God would watch over 
and be near them! 

Holden spoke, and Kenneth followed him. Being 
well-known and well-liked he was greeted with 
cheers and at first listened to intently. But the tide 
was too strong for him. Attempting to remind 
them of the absolute folly and hopelessness of a 
strike, he was cautioned with a hiss from a far cor- 
ner. “He’s been bought!” came the voice after it. 

“It’s a lie!” he cried, flaming up, and nailing his 
glance on the person who had uttered it. And lo! 
as he did so, he discovered a familiar face beside it. 
That face was Potiphar’s! 

Cheers, and cries of “Put him out!” directed 
against his accuser, restored his equanimity and he 


THE' STRIKE AT WHEELING. 25 ! 

continued. But no, they were respectful, but de- 
termined. What though he told them that for 
every man who walked out there were ten waiting 
to take his place; that every strike, almost, had 
been a failure; that a strike without violence was 
unknown — did these defeats lessen the justice of 
their claims, after all? He might remind them 
that the winter was none too far off, that cold, hun- 
ger and nakedness would follow them hither and 
thither in the vain search for employment after- 
wards. “There are comfortable prisons for the 
criminal, palaces for the insane, poor-farms for the 
hopelessly incompetent, but for an able-bodied man 
seeking work at living wages there is no home, 
no refuge, not even a warm cell ! The regulars will 
be called out, you will stone them, revile them, 
curse them; but three years from now such of you 
as are able to stand the physical examination will 
be in their very ranks, perhaps called out to sup- 
press a strike and help shoot your former fellows 
down. The regular army always fills up after a 
strike. Men hate it; but it is their last resort. It’s 
the devil’s own trick — you know it!” 

The clock in the tower was striking twelve. He 
paused, the men were listening; each stroke was a 
century, each echo the groping years. It is hard 
not to cry out to heaven, hard to those of us who 
realise the cause of our distress in the day of our 
fullest desire. How slow are the strokes! Strike! 
strike! strike! Rebellion, reform, renaissance. 
Christ! how slow it is! yet the pendulum still swings 
on. 

The factory whistle followed the last stroke, and 
the next moment the hall was deserted, the 
men tumbling out to join the strikers from 
the works. Five thousand, all told, thronging the 
streets, congregated around bonfires of dry-goods 


GOD’S REBEL . 


252 

boxes and discussing plans for action. No one 
thought of going home, there being an expectant 
note in the atmosphere that something decisive 
might even occur before morning. 

“I have a call to make, Kenneth,” said Holden; 
“you may as well come with me. We can be back 
in half an hour.” 

Together they passed down street after street 
of red brick houses, neat and pleasant without, 
but all poverty-stricken within. “The woman who 
lives here had twins yesterday,” the doctor ex- 
plained, as they stopped and rang a doorbell. “If 
you’ll sit in the front room and wait a moment I’ll 
see how the family is doing.” 

He complied; sitting there in the dark, save for 
the light from the room beyond, where the doctor 
could be seen at the bedside of the woman, who 
had two great bundles wrapped up on each side of 
her, whence arose a squall anon suggestive of 
warmth, comfort, and good living that brought a 
smile to the mother’s face. Three small cot-beds 
occupied by the same number of small children 
were placed within stumbling distance, the gentle 
breathing indicative of peace and quiet slumber and 
a disposition to accept the world as it came. All 
this happiness, Kenneth reflected, at a cost of only 
seventy-one cents per day, according to the esti- 
mate carefully made by the directors of the Wheel- 
ing Company. 

“This is the way America is being peopled for us 
at present,” the doctor observed as they went out. 
“My classmates who settled in wealthy districts 
in the city tell me they have but three or four baby 
cases in a year. I have that many every week. It’s 
a bad thing in these times, too.” 

The warning of Matthew was in his words : “And 


THE STRIKE AT WHEELING. 


253 

woe unto them that are with child, and to them 
that give suck in those days.” 

“Have you considered it — I mean from a socio- 
logical standpoint?” Kenneth asked thoughtfully. 

“Yes, I have had to,” the doctor answered. “Of 
course that nonsensical notion of Malthus’ that the 
means of subsistence increases only at an arith- 
metical ratio, whilst population increases at a geo- 
metrical ratio — unless prevented by warring cir- 
cumstances, is too idiotic almost to be considered.” 

The professor agreed, remarking that such an 
idea, if it ever carried any weight, had been thor- 
oughly exploded. We had no evidence whatever 
to prove that the world’s population has ever in- 
creased, whereas we knew that the means of sub- 
sistence had increased a thousand-fold. “Poverty 
and starvation continue because the mighty choose 
to have it so, not because the world cannot amply 
provide for the subsistence of every man, woman 
and child.” 

“As for that matter of birth-rate,” Holden re- 
sumed, “I have felt that if our labouring men were 
paid the wages they honestly earned, so that 
the race in general could cease to grovel and 
aspire to something higher, then, I believe, we 
should need have no fears of overpopulation. In 
a word, make it possible for men to cease living 
like animals, and they will cease to breed like ani- 
mals. Everyday experience and the commonest 
facts of biology go to prove this, I should think.” 

Some one was addressing the crowd as they re- 
turned; the speaker mounted on a box, his voice 
high pitched and excited, and his gestures threaten- 
ing dire violence to any one so foolish as to dis- 
agree with all that he said. But curiously enough, 
Kenneth thought, the crowd seemed strangely un- 
responsive; on their faces, lit up by the glow of the 


254 


GOD’S REBEL . 


bonfire, he read not only disapproval, but amused 
disgust. After listening a moment he turned to 
Holden in amazement. “Who under the heavens 
is this fellow— and what is he trying to say?” 

Holden smiled. “ Don’t you recognise him, 
then? He’s the man that accused you this evening 
of being bought. Didn’t you discover Mr. Potiphar 
Phillips at his side?” 

Kenneth started. “Ah, so that is the way they 
will try to win! What is the rascal’s name?” 

“Medill, I believe — Jim Medill. He’s a profes- 
sional agitator; makes a good living by inciting 
workmen to strike, to do damage, and then sell- 
ing out to the employers. He’s done it so often 
that both employer and employed have absolute 
confidence in him. Potiphar, you observe, merely 
assists him a trifle; prompts his vocabulary now and 
then.” 

Again Kenneth listened, with growing wonder 
and amusement. Potiphar’s face was flushed, his 
manner a trifle too eager, and from what he knew 
of him he conjectured that drink was the cause. 
He began to wish that Medill would stop and let 
Potiphar speak for himself. For, despite his con- 
tempt for him as a man, there was a certain power 
and fascination in him that he always felt; one of 
those naturally gifted orators, moreover, whom 
simply to hear was to feel more than half convinced 
notwithstanding one’s better judgment. For on 
occasion, as everyone knew, Potiphar could roar 
like a lion at bay, stand on his hind legs and lash 
his tail, and deliver a cuff that would knock justice 
into absolute insensibility for weeks; then anon he 
could be gentle as a kitten, smooth as satin, smug 
as a statute. Seeing him now, Kenneth suddenly 
recalled that famous defense of his in the whiskey- 
trust trial wherein it had been proved, by testi- 


THE STRIKE A T WHEELING. 


mony that was absolutely incontrovertible, that the 
trust had bribed a United States gauger to blow up 
a rival distillery and one-hundred-and-fifty men at 
work there, by means of an infernal machine. 
Everyone now knows the facts. In April, 1888, 
the Chicago distillery firm published that they had 
captured a spy of the trust in their works. He 
gave them a confession in writing. Later a valve 
in the distillery was found to be tampered with in 
such a way as to cause an explosion had it not 
been discovered in time. The distillery firm made 
known the fact that they had been offered one 
million dollars by the trust for their works, which 
they declined. In December the country was start- 
led by the news that this distillery had been the 
scene of an awful explosion of dynamite; all the 
buildings in the vicinity were shaken and many 
panes of glass broken. A jagged hole three feet 
square was torn in the roof. There were fifteen 
hundred barrels of whiskey stored under the roof 
that was torn open; had these been ignited a ter- 
rible fire would have been added to the effect of 
the explosion. A package of dynamite which had 
failed to explode, though the fuse had been lighted, 
was found on the premises by the Chicago police.* 

The evidence was all in; the people waited, 
breathless. 

“Pooh, pooh,” panted Potiphar. “Your Hon- 
our, I move the case be dismissed.” 

People said afterwards it was hypnotic; others 
insisted it was sublime; but all agreed as to its 
being memorable of Potiphar’s prowess. 

Medill talked on; he was insisting that the men 
should do something , but they remained apathetic 

*The author trusts he need scarcely remind the reader 
that the above story is no fabrication. Time, scene and 
facts may readily be verified. 


GOD’S REBEL. 


256 

in spite of his eloquence. A freight engine backed 
into town, noisily clanging its bell and coupling 
on to a long train of freight cars that stood on the 
siding; then rolled heavily out towards the city. 
Ere the rumble of its wheels had yet died away, 
Medill shouted out in a' last effort — 

“That’s the way with you fellows; you wait too 
long. You are all cowards; you keep putting 
things off till your last chance is gone. But I say 
we must do something to keep the scabs off. In- 
side of twenty-four hours there will be ten thousand 
of them here to take your jobs — to steal the bread 
out of the mouths of your starving wives and chil- 
dren. That’s what has happened where people 
have been too slow, my friends, in Ireland, in Rus- 
sia •” 

“And Hindustan,” prompted Potiphar. 

“Yes, and in Hindustan,” echoed Medill. But 
at this moment a carriage came rattling down the 
street, stopped at the margin of the crowd, and Mr. 
Medill’s strictures on Hindustan and other fanciful 
slave nations were suddenly terminated by the loud 
cheers that greeted the newcomer. Mounting upon 
a box, in a few quiet well-chosen words he assured 
the men that they had the sympathy of the intelli- 
gent people all over the country; warned them 
against doing anything rash, and promised them 
that on the morrow every railroad in the country 
would be tied up that attempted to haul Wheeling 
cars. “Only stand together and commit no vio- 
lence.” 


THE CRIMSON SIGN 


25 7 


CHAPTER XXII. 

THE CRIMSON SIGN. 

Inspired by the last speaker, no one now thought 
of going home that night; some of the men be- 
guiled themselves with the pleasing thought that 
satisfactory terms might be effected with the com- 
pany before morning; but as the hours dragged on 
in the night, bringing no word from their masters 
that the slightest notice had been taken of their 
rebellion, the many began already to doubt and 
lose faith. They were so few, after all, and so weak; 
only five thousand men — no! they were not men, 
but commodities on an already over-stocked mar- 
ket; their value regulated not in accordance with 
the profits made by the company, but by the condi- 
tion of the wholesale market for men and the lowest 
possible wages on which they could keep soul and 
body together. This, obviously, was the iron law 
of wages; they discussed it in little groups here 
and there as it dawned on their minds. Why, they 
wondered, had they never felt even an inkling of 
this truth on election day, when orators had talked 
to them glibly of a protective tariff that would in- 
crease the profits for their masters and so increase 
wages in exact correspondence? What folly, to 
think that their masters would ever give them a 
portion of their increased profits, when they could 
always buy hundreds of men so cheap in the open 
markets! So they saw it now, some of them; knew 
that not until the entire system was changed could 
they expect justice, would humanity cease to be a 
commodity. 

“I can’t help yearning, Henry, for the good old 
17 


258 


GOD’S REBEL . 


days of slavery whenever I see a sight like this,” 
Kenneth sighed wearily as they started for the doc- 
tor’s home just as dawn was breaking. “A good 
strong negro was always worth from five hundred 
to fifteen hundred dollars, and being so valuable 
he was generally comfortably housed and fed. 
Owners of fine stock know enough to take care of 
it. But what is one of these men worth to-day? 
What is a coal-miner worth, tailors, street-car oper- 
atives, gripmen on open-cars in mid-winter, men 
who toil in sulphurous smelters and are thankful to 
get to hell in three years, handsome wenches in 
department-stores and on the street — what are such 
worth? Good God! not one of them that, in de- 
spair of finding work and a comfortable home, 
could mortgage himself for two hundred dollars, 
nay! two hundred cents, even to save himself from 
the last resort of suicide or starvation!” 

“Fifty suicides in this city last month, I believe; 
mostly from economic causes,” the doctor added 
thoughtfully. 

“Yes, yes,” his companion continued satirically; 
“you see there is really a crying need for a first-class 
auction platform and capable auctioneers in our 
cities where men may be sold as of old. This thing 
of making them advertise for an owner and mean- 
while die in despair is just a trifle thoughtless and 
unjust. Possibly historians may speak of it to 
our discredit fifty years hence.” 

As they were leaving, a magnificent passenger 
train rolled through the town from the West; a 
solid line of Wheeling sleepers made in these very 
shops. The workmen gazed after them sullenly, 
perplextly. It was the way with everything they 
created. It was labour, not wealth, that had wings. 
The value contained in the carved mahogany, the 
luxurious upholstering, the faultless carriages 


THE CRIMSON SIGN 


259 


turned true to the light that beamed from the work- 
man’s trained eye, the permanency of years that 
had been exchanged by him for a price barely suf- 
ficient to keep him and his family from daily starva- 
tion — Ah, it took a mighty brain to grasp this pro- 
found social problem , and he was so ignorant! 

“But he’s envious — that’s all that ails him!” ex- 
claims the Pharisee. 

With the first train to Wheeling in the morning 
had come Mr. James Dana. Being one of the prin- 
cipal officers and heaviest stockholders of the com- 
pany, he had left his home in the outskirts of the 
city before daylight in reply to a telephone message 
from the superintendent to come immediately. Cau- 
tiously, silently, but with great impatience he had 
stolen out without awakening anybody, and was 
striding along at a tremendous pace towards the 
station, when, on the corner of the very last alley, 
a couple of young gentlemen shoved their revol- 
vers into his face and invited him to step in out of 
the wind. 

“Faugh!” he remonstrated in a low but impa- 
tient voice, his hands held in an uncomfortable 
manner high above his head the while one of the 
men rifled his pockets. “Now what do you want 
to do this for? It’s not right; it’s contrary to 
Scripture. Why don’t you go to work like honest 
men?” 

“Hully gee! Listen to his gaff, Sleepy. Now 
look here, my friend, just tell us what a honest 
man can do in dis town? Where’s dey any job any 
honester’n dis?” 

“Nonsense! nonsense! Why, I’d give you both 
good jobs at two dollars a day!” 

Sleepy stared. “What sort of a game are you 
running, colonel?” he asked, curiously but incred- 
ulously. And to his partner: “That’s right; sneak 


26 o 


GOD’S REBEL . 


his wad first, Bill. Then we can chin on the 
square. Now then, colonel, fire ahead!” 

Sleepy was a gentleman, there was surely no 
doubt about this, and being clearly the cashier of 
the firm he was pleased to be polite when serving a 
good customer. 

Mr. Dana grasped at the invitation. Great oc- 
casions sometimes arise, suddenly, without warn- 
ing or preparation, that arouse like wildfire all a 
man’s generous and benevolent instincts. Under 
its subtle impulse some men have been known to 
weep, to kiss their children, to give away their 
money to churches, to libraries, and to universi- 
ties. On such occasions a man’s past is said to 
sweep swiftly over him with all the vividness of 
a drowning man’s last despairing glimpse over the 
bright surface of creation. Yet again, calm, lofty, 
propitious moments sometimes, fraught with a 
mountain of duties hitherto shunned or omitted; 
giant missionary enterprises, schemes for the salva- 
tion of society, impulsive, perhaps, and untrained, 
but nevertheless earnest, sincere, sweet with the 
promise of redemption for one’s self, memorial 
windows, and a name in the newspapers in capitals. 

And again he generously offered them both jobs 
at two dollars a day — if they would try to be hon- 
est. 

Sleepy saluted the pavement and spoke, slowly, 
but candidly, courteously: “I’ve no doubt you 
mean all right, colonel,” he admitted, “but it ain’t 
possible. You see, I’ve thought about such deals; 
I used to be in the swell push, but I came to the 
conclusion that it was all too dishonest for me. 
Now if you pay me two plunks per, it is because 
my labour creates every day the value of eight 
plunks for you. Hence I am paying you six plunks 
per for the sake of working for you. No, it won’t 


THE CRIMSON SIGN. 


261 

do; it ain’t honest, colonel. Bill, sneak his super. 
Good-morning, colonel. Walk straight, now!” 

Mr. Dana handed over his watch and cursed in- 
wardly. He felt very envious, extremely envious! 
He was obliged to run back to his house and swear 
at his wife and borrow enough money to take him 
to Wheeling. 

“You will go and see Julia, dear, when you get 
there,” called his wife after him as he left the 
bed-room. 

“Of course; wnat a foolish question!” he an- 
swered irritably, half-way down the stairs. 

“And James?” again called his wife. 

“Well, what is it?” he snapped. ’Twas the second 
time he had been held up that morning, and the 
town of Wheeling was all going to the devil in his 
absence. 

“I wish you would tell Julia’s husband, dear, that 
the medicine he prescribed for my stomach seems 
someway to make it worse.” 

“Oh, bother!” he snorted, with spleen. “Tell him 
yourself, can’t you? I’ve got matter enough of 
my own to speak with him about.” 

Mrs. Dana sat bolt-upright in bed. “Why, 
what’s the trouble, James?” 

“Trouble? Strike is the trouble — down at 
Wheeling; and that doctor of Julia’s is at the bot- 
tom of it. But I’m off.” And Mr. Dana ran out, 
resolving to tell Dr. Holden that if he would pay 
more attention to his mother-in-law’s stomach and 
less to his father-in-law’s factory that it would re- 
sult vastly to their mutual advantage and happi- 
ness. 

For he had never forgiven Julia’s marriage; he 
disliked the doctor heartily, and his theories; a 
relic of that primitive law of brute creation, per- 
chance, wherein one animal feels an instinctive an- 


262 


GOD'S REBEL . 


tipathy for all other animals that are obvious ene- 
mies to his own exclusive welfare. Moreover, 
though Mr. James Dana’s father had been a plain 
everyday man of the people, of generous democratic 
principles, and had stood close to our last great 
commoner in his fight against slavery, yet the son 
was a confirmed aristocrat. He believed in propa- 
gating plutocracy; Julia, therefore, his only child, 
had through this marriage offended him more than 
he cared to confess, especially when he beheld so- 
ciety in general disposed to poke fun at his princi- 
ples. Some men, even, had dared to whisper, so 
loud that he plainly overheard it, that “old Dana 
was a damned excrescence on the face of civiliza- 
tion,” and to make obnoxious comparisons between 
him and his father, alleging that the father’s whole 
life had been devoted to the freeing of slaves, where- 
as the son was intent only on building up another 
system of slavery infinitely worse than that over- 
thrown by his father. This of course was very 
unpleasant to hear. Nor did he ever call at Julia’s 
save when he knew the doctor was absent. 

Therefore after being up all night with the 
strikers, when the doctor came home to breakfast 
bringing Kenneth with him, he was met on the 
threshold by Julia who informed him that her 
father had just been there and that he was very 
angry. 

“He insists that you shall stop the strike at once, 
Henry,” said she, doubtfully. 

“Why, Julia,” he answered with a laugh, “that’s 
exactly what we’ve been trying to do all night.” 
He unfolded the newspaper beside his plate. 
“Hello; listen to this, old man!” 

“ ‘Great strike at Wheeling! Yielding to the 
persuasion of that auburn-haired apologist of anar- 
chy and aberrant abolitionist of property rights, 


THE CRIMSON SIGN. 


263 

Professor Kenneth Moore, with the assistance of 
that hare-brained friend of his, that pubescent pros- 
elyte and puling village physician who a short 
time ago startled polite society by eloping with 

his benefactor’s daughter ” 

“Good heavens!” Julia exclaimed, dropping the 
cream-pitcher. 

“ ‘Five thousand men have deliberately locked 
themselves out from honest industry and chosen 
starvation for themselves and helpless families.’ ” 
“Oh, Henry! don’t read any more of that stuff,” 
Julia begged. “Why don’t you and Professor 
Moore sue them?” She hesitated, coloured. “But 
then, that’s what everybody says about you.” 

The doctor threw the paper aside. “No, my 
dear, I beg your pardon. The daily newspaper 
conies a long way to-day from being the voice of 
everybody. It is merely the voice of the hired man, 
editor or reporter, who is paid to write in this 
style by the aggregate capital of the country. Poor 
devil! he can’t help himself. I’m sorry you broke 
that pitcher, dear; it’s a too expensive habit for us.” 

Kenneth said nothing. Despite the doctor’s 
words, the imposition practised on the public, day 
after day, by the daily newspaper was not pleasant. 
In the event of a strike, he had learned, nothing 
was ever said by the paper of the economic causes 
behind it. They confined themselves to the recital 
of trifles, of incidents pathetic and amusing. John 
Brown and his sick wife with nine helpless chil- 
dren were starving to death picturesquely, whilst 
his neighbour, James Smith, had pneumonia, and 
his wife had a baby, with nothing to eat in the 
house. Pictures followed, descriptive of the plain- 
tive plight of the Brown and Smith families, and 
resembling those same specimens of art that were 
employed to illustrate the famine horrors in India 


264 


GOD'S REBEL . 


and more recently Cuba. Manifestly, the papers 
kept a large supply of this art material on hand, 
and which was found nearly always available. 
Plenty of pathos, sentiment, but not a word, not 
a figure, that would serve to supply the key to it 
all and suggest the infallible remedy. They were 
wonderfully short on arithmetic. 

Still there were a few people left in the country, 
he felt, who would not be flim-flammed in this 
fashion. Recognising the power behind that ran 
the machine, they had come to treat its every ex- 
pression with the contempt that was merited. 
False in one thing false in all, was the motto 
adopted after they had once opened their eyes. 
They had quit reading newspapers for facts, and 
were now depending on books wherein the author 
had penned his beliefs, upon honour, and whose 
sincerity, ability, and inductive method covering 
the history of all time, were absolutely unimpeach- 
able. Half a dozen books of this kind were worth 
several centuries of newspapers, or magazines 
either, wherein that so-called timid thing, private 
capital, was plainly at work. Consequently when 
such a reader heard of the Wheeling strike his 
very first thought would be: How much money has 
the corporation actually invested, and how much 
fictitious stock is it seeking to pay dividends on 
by sweating its employes? Whereto the corpora- 
tion was wont to reply, through the newspapers 
in the ring: This is none of your business; you are 
envious! 

“Would you like to glance over this newspaper, 
Kenneth ?” the doctor asked. 

“Oh, no, I thank you/’ he answered as he drank 
his coffee; “it is all too much like that old tale of 
St. Peter apropos of the late millionaire arrival 
from America. Says St. Peter: ‘Jay ' — or Andrew 


THE CRIMSON SIGN. 


265 

or John — ‘J a y> if a workman produces the value of 
four dollars and thou takest three dollars away from 
him, and then- two-thirds more of his remainder for 
water-tax, how much will he have left?’ Whereto 
Jay: ‘Methinks, your worship, if the workman be 
industrious he should have five dollars and fifty 
cents left.’ Thereupon St. Peter taps his nose 
lightly three times with his index finger. 'Ah, Jay, 
thou knowest in good sooth thou art a sad jester. 
Go below!’ ” 

The doctor laughed, spilling his coffee. "And for 
once, I suppose, Jay takes a tumble to himself.” 

Mr. Dana did not return to the doctor’s house, 
being too busily occupied with the superintendent 
all day long in employing men to fill the positions 
of the strikers. Men who had been unemployed 
for months came down upon the town of Wheeling 
in swarms. Seeing this the strikers became un- 
easy, and finally angry. By noon the situation was 
ominous; and by night-fall, inflamed by the specta- 
cle of strange men using the tools that had many 
years been their own, they had completely forgot- 
ten their starvation resolution passed only the night 
before, and were ready for any deed that would 
compel the corporation to grant their reasonable 
demands. 

Nor were there lacking among them men who at 
such times believed in the use of force, basing their 
right to this instrument upon history and the ex- 
perience of the past. The past! that holy-of-holies 
of conservatives, yet out of which the veriest dema- 
gogues now found precedents by the score to mock 
and hurl them to ruin. Already the men were 
divided into hostile factions on this; the breach 
rapidly widening as paid agitators worked among 
them, urging the men to some act of lawlessness 
that might serve to call out the regular army, and 


266 


GOD’S REBEL. 


thus give protection to unemployed thousands 
waiting to rush in. 

“Every great reform the world h^s ever known,” 
mouthed Medill, again mounted in front of the 
bonfire, “has been accomplished by force. Force 
was the means that seated Christianity on the site 
of the Empire ; that sustained Mohammed ; brought 
the Reformation; wrote the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence; overthrew negro slavery. Are we to 
abandon it now? Ain’t the means that was good 
enough for our grandfathers” — Medill was born in 
Ireland — “for Thomas Jefferson, George Washing- 
ton, and Abraham Lincoln, good enough for us?” 

Kenneth turned to the doctor. “Is there no way 
to strangle this fellow?” 

“No,” Holden answered; “you see the danger 
lies in the fact that what he says is no more than 
the truth; it’s the past with a vengeance — conser- 
vatism come home to roost. Whereas your own 
wish, your idea, your hope that society’s next ad- 
vance towards greater freedom may come without 
force, is merely a theory after all.” 

Nevertheless they had worked incessantly 
throughout the day, as on the night before, per- 
suading the men to keep within lawful bounds. 
Early in the day, beholding how rapidly positions 
were being filled with outsiders, they had gone, ac- 
companied by the leaders of the strike, to the su- 
perintendent, and urged that he cancel all engage- 
ments with new men and offer to all the strikers 
their old positions. 

“No, sir,” declared that official peremptorily. 
“Such positions as have not already been filled the 
old workmen may have on applying. The new men 
will not be discharged.” 

This declaration received an ovation in the papers 
all the way from New York to San Francisco. 


THE CRIMSON SIGN. 


267 


“Shall a man not be allowed to run his own busi- 
ness to suit himself? What do we care for what 
the labourer calls his rights? He has none — he is 
only a commodity on a falling market !” 

Hence there was no other course save to urge 
the men to stand together now as they had agreed, 
not to retreat in a panic, leaving the devil to take 
the hindmost. Meanwhile every railroad leading 
out of the city had been tied up as promised, the 
railway employes having struck in sympathy. But 
by noon many places had been filled, new train- 
crews were made up, and preparations completed for 
running the trains as usual. 

At one of the main switches a new man had been 
stationed. A striker came up and seized him by 
the arm. “Come away,” he insisted; “come away! 
Good God! can’t you see that you are fighting 
against yourself, your own people? We are all in 
the same boat together!” 

The man looked at him; shook his head. “Yes,” 
he answered sullenly, “I know all about that. I 
once struck for my rights, and a scab got my job. 
I’ve been out of work for a year. I know it’s a 
matter of principle with you fellows, but I’ve 
learned that a man can’t afford to have any prin- 
ciples in this world; can’t be on the square. I’ve 
got to live, and my family.” 

“But you’re cutting your own throat! Any- 
way, you’ll be mobbed if you stay here.” 

“All right; go ahead!” 

An injunction had already been secured, enjoin- 
ing the men from interfering with trains carrying 
the mails. Shortly after dark a freight train of ten 
dilapidated box-cars loaded with straw and empty 
dry-goods boxes had been backed into town and 
left upon a side-track close to the factory, with 
only two raw militia-men to guard it, stationed at 


268 


GOD’S REBEL . 


either end. It was but a short distance from where 
Medill stood speaking in front of the bonfire, and 
at his suggestion of cars loaded with precious 
woods, costly cloths, luxurious trappings which 
were to be used for the purpose of making fetters 
for slaves, for sweating them into a condition so 
abject that in a few months they would be utterly 
unrecognizable in the scheme of God and human- 
ity— “Are ye dogs ? Are ye slaves ? Will ye stand 
it, men?” 

A tremendous shout rose up, sweeping out over 
the prairie, echoing against the tall buildings of the 
city and carrying consternation to the strongholds 
of capital. The Huns and Vandals were ready to 
ravish the Empire. 

“To hell with them! Hang the thieves! Burn 
them up!” 

In a trice the mischief was done. The bonfire 
that had blazed to shed light upon the scene was 
quickly set upon; brands seized, whilst the sparks 
flew to the stars. Howling succeeded cheers; 
curses clutched at the throat; the mob was maud- 
lin, mad. Where Kenneth stood at the marge, the 
entire mass swept by like a cloud and a river of 
flame to wreak destruction on whatever stood in its 
path. 

It had all come up so swiftly as to take him un- 
awares. He had meant to give warning, but how 
could he speak to that mob? There remained but 
one course. Two-thirds of the way to the freight 
train and he had overtaken them; was at their 
head. 

“Go back,” he shouted; “go back! You fools! 
Can’t you see it’s only a bait?” 

They jeered and pushed past him, cursing him; 
somebody spat in his face as he fell on one knee. 
When he got to his feet his blood was up. No, 


THE CRIMSON SIGN. 


269 


they should not do this thing. He’d shoot the very 
first fool that applied a torch. The leaders were 
yards ahead of him; he felt in his pocket, drew out 
a revolver, and ran on with the pack at his heels. 

The foremost were now within a dozen yards 
of the militiaman. One could see that he was 
frightened. Knowing naught of the contents of 
the cars and being stationed there to protect them 
he meant to do so. He would be teased and 
laughed at by the fellows who clerked in the office 
with him if he didn’t. He knew nothing of the 
wrongs of labour — such questions had never in- 
terested him. Besides he was now a soldier; sol- 
diers aren’t supposed to think; their sole duty is to 
shoot when commanded. Still, he had not ex- 
pected an attack so soon; it was too early in the 
strike. 

“Keep back!” he cried, levelling his rifle. “Keep 
back!” 

He scarce heard his own words. Some one threw 
a brand that struck him fairly in the face. His 
knees trembled, not knowing what he did he pulled 
the trigger. 

In the deep silence that followed you could hear 
the men drop, and their moans. Then, curses of 
hell! what a cry! The militiaman dropped his gun 
with a yell and dodged suddenly beneath a car, 
dashing away like a deer into the darkness of the 
prairie beyond. The flames that shot up from the 
cars and a thousand torches just lit the edge of his 
heels as he flew, causing one of the strikers to send 
a bullet after him from his own abandoned rifle. 
He dropped, and the darkness swallowed him. 

Directly every new man employed by the com- 
pany was driven from his position by the now thor- 
oughly enraged strikers sweeping everything before 
them. The first shot had made them reckless, 


270 


GOD’S REBEL. 


wholly indifferent to consequences; insomuch that 
when a train finally entered the town, cars filled 
by hundreds of unemployed from every point of 
the earth and completely guarded and backed up 
by a company of militia, it was met by a thousand 
strikers with arms levelled to kill. And the fight 
began. No need to ask at this point with the dil- 
ettante: Who dropped the handkerchief, gave the 
crimson sign? The old, old struggle, master on 
one hand and the slaves on the other. True, there 
was no capital invested in slaves’ bodies. It was 
unnecessary, the market being always close to the 
master’s door; sometimes Hungarians, Italians, 
Irish, and anon Chinamen and Negroes, even the 
late-coming but inevitable American — the master 
might take his choice. 

Half an hour later, when the riot that followed 
had been partially quelled, Holden came up where 
Kenneth was standing and touched him on the 
arm. “Ah, here you are,” he said. “Are you going 
home to-night or will you come with me? I sup- 
pose you’ve heard that Phillips is dead? Ten lives, 
all told.” 

“Phillips? Good heavens! What happened to 
him?” 

“Stabbed. I have just come from him. Some 
one drove a knife clean through his heart. Msdill 
has disappeared.” 

“And his wife — is she here? Has she been told?” 

“Who, Mrs. Phillips? Oh, no; you see it just 
occurred, not ten minutes ago. She ought to be 
told, I suppose. By the way, you know her, don’t 
you?” 

He started violently. “Oh, no — yes. But I can’t 
tell her that. Wait! I could tell Miss Nielsen, 
perhaps. Would you mind coming with me, 
Henry, as a particular favour?” 


THE CRIMSON SIGN. 


271 


The physician assented. ‘Tf you wish it, surely.” 

Finding a carriage they started at once; intend- 
ing to drive by the way of Wildwood, where Ken- 
neth would stop and leave word with Mabel, and 
then hasten on. As they left the hue-and-cry of 
the town behind them, the swift contrast of silence 
surrounding, grew profoundly impressive, neither 
one speaking a word for awhile. ’Twas already past 
ten o’clock, but light as day, the full moon floating 
midway to the zenith in a cloudless sky. They were 
soon in the midst of the prairie, with no buildings 
nearer than the little suburban towns scattered 
round them at the distance of a mile or more, the 
lights of whose cottages, rising above the lowland 
haze, made them appear like tiny vessels afloat on 
a summer sea. 

“I can’t help thinking,” the doctor remarked at 
last, with professional forgetfulness, perhaps, of 
their mission’s all too painful aspect as he lit his 
cigar — “I can’t help thinking, somehow, of the 
first time we saw him. You remember, don’t you, 
at Monte Carlo; just such a night as this. I recol- 
lect your taking his card and afterward reading 
it, and our amusement over his name. Well, the 
grand croupier has called his last Rein ne va plus 
for Potiphar. And his wife — she was certainly a 
striking looking woman. By the way, you played 
with her, didn’t you, Kenneth?” 

A pause followed. Anon the silence seemed to 
rouse his companion with a start. “I beg your 
pardon, Henry. Did you speak?” 

Holden nodded, tapping the ash from his cigar. 
“I was recalling the time you played together; 
that’s all.” 

“Oh, yes; when we were children,” Kenneth 
answered shortly, again relapsing into sub-con- 
sciousness. 


272 


GOD'S REBEL . 


This time the physician started. Was his friend 
referring satirically to that occasion but a few years 
back when they both fancied that they were men? 
Or had the teeming years just passed — in this dull 
industrial world wherein men and women must 
seek relief from stagnation in inconsequential nov- 
els — been indeed so significant to him, so full of 
struggle, sacrifice, of that almost constant yet un- 
avoidable warfare against time-honoured yet tyran- 
nous institutions, as to make all previous years 
seem but the merest halcyon of childhood? 

At the door of his home in Wildwood Kenneth 
sprang out. “Just a moment, Henry,” he said, 
and let himself in with his latch-key. The house 
was dark. Mabel must have gone out, he thought. 
Still, it was late; she surely would be home at this 
hour. Or she might have left a note for him in 
his study. He went in, and lit the gas. No; his 
papers were there on his desk, undisturbed, just as 
he had last sat there — with the addition of no sin- 
gle slip of paper. “Mabel!” he called hurriedly, 
stepping into the hall; “Mabel!” Then stood still 
and listened, whilst her name echoed and fell and 
the silence stole over him. In front of him stood 
her piano, still open, the strings murmuring back 
a faint response to his call. Ah, it was still sing- 
ing that German ballad! “Mabel” — louder, this 
time, as he flew up the stairs to her room. 

It was in perfect order, as usual, but with the 
misdoubt that had seized him he went straight to 
the dresser. Yes, there it lay; it was what he had 
feared, what the silence had whispered. It was 
deep red, the envelope; deep red — he could see it 
in the night. 

He lit the gas, and paused, holding the letter in 
his hand — 

“Kenneth.” 

How red it was; heart-red — and how fragrant! 


THE CRIMSON SIGN 


273 


“I could not say good-by,” she wrote; “you 
would only argue, and it would do no good. And 
I am so tired of it all — I can endure it no longer. 
I shall go where I can make my own living — by 
singing, possibly. O Kenneth! I did not think I 
was born for this. I cannot understand what it 
was that came over you — changed you so. Every- 
thing is gone — you have ruined my life. I must 
begin all over again. Mabel.” 

He was aroused by voices below, and Holden 
calling his name, the while he continued to stand 
there holding the letter. He now dimly remem- 
bered hearing his door-bell ring a short time be- 
fore, and with momentary wonder at its meaning. 
Footsteps began ascending the stairs. 

“Ah, old man, I’ve bad news for you,” Holden 
said, stepping into the room. “However, it’s only 
a trick; we shall ” 

Kenneth turned ; Holden caught a glimpse of his 
face. 

“My God! Kenneth, what is the trouble?” 

“Nothing — that is, you know, I suppose. Ah, 
what does this gentleman want?” 

An officer had followed Holden into the room 
and stood waiting respectfully. At Kenneth’s 
words he glanced towards Holden for answer. The 
latter made no sign. 

“I am sorry to trouble you, Mr. Moore,” the offi- 
cer stammered, pausing a moment to clear his 
voice; “I have a warrant for your arrest.” 

“My arrest? What on earth is the charge?” 

“It’s on account of the strike,” the officer an- 
swered, in low apologetic tones. “Interfering with 
United States mails.” 

Kenneth turned slowly towards Holden, his face 
giving lively evidence of the conflicting emotions 
within him. “Henry,” said he queerly, “what a — 
18 


274 


GOD'S REBEL . 


what a jest it all is! Can no one be serious? Even 
Uncle Sam must have his little joke out, I suppose. 
Good heavens!” he broke into laughter; “so I in- 
terfered with the mails, did I? You see how — how 
fortunate it is, old man, that she neglected to put 
a stamp on her letter. Ha! What if I had inter- 
fered with that! There is really no limit, you see, 
to my capacity for devilish and criminal deeds once 
the law has been rightly constructed — when honest 
men all become criminals, and all criminals honest 
men! Well, officer, what is the penalty? Gad! I 
believe hanging would be about right — don’t you 
think so, Henry?” 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

FAIRY GOD-MOTHERS AGAIN— AND 
CINDERELLA . 

It was late in the fall ere his release came, after 
he had served four full months’ imprisonment and 
the public’s appetite for the just had been in a 
measure appeased. However, there had never been 
any doubt of his guilt; his trial had proved that 
conclusively. Abundant testimony had been ad- 
duced, moreover, showing clearly the dangerous 
and wicked trend of his teachings — invariably to- 
wards confusion and spoliation of the favoured few 
to the advantage of the unfavoured many. As was 
only natural, of course, the few failed to 1 see any- 
thing beneficent in such an ideal. “He is unset- 
tling all the established principles of Democracy, 
of Christianity!” they, the settlers, exclaimed, 
hands perpendicular in virtuous indignation. 
“Yes,” he had admitted with a laugh; “thieves in 


FAIRY G OD-MO THERS A GAIN. 275 

general, of all species and time, past or present, 
whether in divine purple or equally divine broad- 
cloth, detest the idea of spoliation of themselves at 
the hands of the vulgar public already despoiled.” 

And to the friend at his side as the clouds low- 
ered, after certain impeccable witnesses had assev- 
erated that he had run at the head of the mob with 
drawn revolver, had fiendishly driven the men to 
fire the freight cars and shoot down the unfor- 
tunate militiaman stationed to guard them — “You 
see, Henry, I shall be fortunate to escape hanging, 
after all.” 

His sentence had been for six months, but to- 
wards the end society began to relent; beheld him 
suffering, and sympathised. Especially when, 
shortly afterwards, having won its fight with the 
strikers, the Wheeling Car Co. declared a divi- 
dend of forty per cent, and once more watered 
its stock. Thereupon certain men declared boldly, 
in public, that Professor Moore’s fight had been 
in the best interests of humanity, of the Republic; 
that he had done right in encouraging the strikers, 
interfering with United States mails, even. Aye, 
that it were better the United States had no mails 
if slaves must be shackled to carry them. More- 
over a strong popular movement had set in to- 
wards municipal ownership of certain robber mon- 
opolies; and stranger than all, beholding how one 
set of men had lately acquired thousands of miles 
of railroads, the Republican had actually come out 
in an anarchistic editorial saying: “Let these men 
beware! The people of this country are too in- 
telligent calmly to permit one set of men to con- 
tinue monopolising heaven and earth to their own 
selfish aggrandizement.” O prescient Republican! 

On his release he had returned to his home in 
Wildwood where Holden had been living during 


GOD’S REBEL . 


276 

the past four months; for, responsive to that same 
force that had imprisoned his friend, the physician 
had been told by the superintendent after the strike 
that the company had decided to appoint a new 
doctor to look after the health of the town of 
Wheeling, and that “the place wasn’t really large 
enough to support two.” Whereupon Julia had 
affirmed positively: “It is all papa’s work, Henry! 
I told him so, too; told him we had received notice 
to quit, and he pretended to be awfully surprised — 
said that he felt great sympathy, even anguish, 
over it. But I said to him that that was all right, 
only he needn’t expect to fool all the people all 
the time.” 

Her husband laughed. “Tut! what did he say 
to that?” 

“Oh my! he was awfully angry!” her eyes grow- 
ing big at the memory. “He just got right up and 
left the table. Afterwards mamma told me he 
swore that I was just as big an anarchist as that 
husband of mine. Wasn’t it funny? Still, it’s per- 
fectly outrageous that he should be so stubborn and 
speak of us so. It makes mamma feel badly. How- 
ever, I’m precious glad we don’t have to live in this 
old town of his any longer!” 

Her husband, though, could not take it so 
lightly. He had but little money saved, and very 
little property. He had now been in Wildwood 
several months without making a dollar. Yet when 
Kenneth came back, and with prospects clearly the 
most gloomy and hopeless — looking broken and 
worn, apology for the insistent bread-and-butter 
burden of life trembling on his lips, despite the 
satirical protest that he never felt better in his 
life, more anxious for a fight — Holden had an- 
swered heartily — 

“That’s right, old man! Only don’t go in for a 


FAIRY GOD-MOTHERS AGAIN. 277 

fight just yet; wait awhile. Try and be dishonest, 
if you can, and you will surely find a place waiting 
for you in this world. Anyway, you know that 
whatever I have is yours.” 

A few days after this he had called on Mr. Lud- 
ington, in response to that kindly interest and good 
feeling to which the old man had testified in a re- 
cent letter. “Come to me,” he had written, “and 
if I can do anything under heaven, my lad, to set 
you right with the world, God knows you will not 
find me aping the Pharisee.” 

He rang the door-bell. An old coloured servant 
that had known him ever since he was a child 
opened the door. “Well, I declar’ to goodness!” 
he cried, his expression passing swiftly from polite 
indifference to amaze, thence delight — “Ef it ain’t 
Mr. Kenneth!” 

Kenneth smiled; extended his hand. “Is he in, 
George?” 

“Oh, yes, sah; he’s in all right. Step right in. 
But now ef I ain’t declared ’fore ev’body, Mr. Ken- 
neth, mo’n fifty times, that that trial of your’n was 
the mos’ excruciatin’ piece of legislation that a full- 

blooded American citizen ev ” 

,“Sh! I will surprise him.” 

He passed into the library, his light footsteps 
on the yielding carpet giving no warning of his ap- 
proach; found the old gentleman seated in his easy 
chair, his back towards him, deep in an edition de 
luxe of Spencer’s Social Statics. 

“How — how do you like him, Mr. Ludington?” 

The old man gave a start, attempted hastily to 
rise. “Kenneth!” he cried hoarsely; “is it you?” 

“Yes; no, don’t get up. It’s not worth while — 
the doctrine of laissez faire will easily fit all occa- 
sions. Haven’t you learned that yet, Uncle 
Amos?” 


GOD'S REBEL. 


278 

The old man grasped his hand, searched the face 
beneath its mockery. “Be seated, Kenneth,” he 
said finally. And after chatting of affairs in gen- 
eral for a space, he added: “Now tell me, what 
are your plans? Of course you have heard from 
Mabel?” 

“No” — with a shake of the head; “that is, only 
what the papers say. You know she is singing in 
London — with success, I believe.” 

“But you have written her, surely,” the old man 
continued; “you have urged her to come back?” 

Again a shake of the head. “Come back? Where 
to — a prison? Or to the home of a man without a 
penny and without work? No; I’ve not written 
her. I ruined her life, she believes. Well, I’ve no 
wish to ruin it further.” 

“Nonsense! nonsense!” the old man expostu- 
lated. “Why, whatever put such an idea into your 
head? You forget, my lad, that the family is the 
very foundation of society; that it is sacred, in- 
violable — to be preserved at all hazards! Dear 

me! your theories, Kenneth, your — your ” He 

gave it up. 

Kenneth leaned back in his chair. “If men and 
women, Uncle Amos, were only as free as the little 
birds of the air, and had the same power of chang- 
ing their environment whenever required to meet 
their necessities, the food of life and the right to 
get it being free, unmonopolised — then, perhaps, 
the family might be preserved intact. But as it is, 
what right have I, having nothing, to inflict my 
life upon hers? No; I am very glad, of course, 
that she has done well, but as for the old life — it is 
past.” 

“Oh, no; no, no! It is all false, Kenneth, all 
false!” Mr. Ludington rallied vigourously. “Why, 
on the contrary, I have always had a feeling that 


FAIRY GOD-MOTHERS AGAIN. 


279 


you would have done better, infinitely better, my 
lad, if you had only had a larger family — children, 
you know, close family ties! That’s what makes a 
man manly, successful! You’ve always played the 
egoist — couldn’t help it, in fact; but a large family 
would have cured you. I assure you it would!” 

Kenneth’s eyes lost their twinkle, became grave. 
“I don’t understand,” he said painfully. 

“Well, then — h’m! what I mean, you know, is 
that you would have thought more of your family; 
become absorbed in it — to the exclusion of every- 
thing else.” 

Silence. “That is to say,” he answered finally, 
“that you believe the burden of life might have op- 
pressed me so sharply that I should have been glad 
to resort to any trick, any scheme, by which to 
provide for my family — that their interests would 
have been paramount, even to the exclusion of tell- 
ing the truth, if necessary, in order to get a living.” 
He laughed. “Surely, Uncle Amos, you don’t be- 
lieve that is manly — you must have just read that 
out of Spencer?” 

The old gentleman fidgeted in his chair. “Um! 
But have you no plans, Kenneth? Won’t you keep 
on teaching?” 

“Well, that remains to be seen. You see, I ap- 
plied to various colleges before my term was out 
here; but to no purpose. The majority of our 
schools have no department of economics. For 
instance, one of the largest and most influential 
schools in Pennsylvania to which I wrote replied 
that they had no regular lectures on political-econ- 
omy, but that an attorney from New York was 
in the habit of running down there twice a month 
and giving a lecture, which the students were at 
liberty to attend or stay away as they chose. Think 


28 o 


GOD’S REBEL . 


of that — an attorney giving lectures on economics! 
The devil giving lectures on theology!” 

The old gentleman laughed. “What school is 
that?” 

But he would not give the name; merely stating 
that this particular college was run by the money 
derived from the railroad that controlled the entire 
anthracite output of the United States. “Natural- 
ly,” he added, “they do not care to inculcate 
economic truths.” 

Mr. Ludington mused a moment. “I hoped,” 
he said at last, “that you would be less severe in 
your construction, Kenneth, as — as time passed 
on. That you would learn to — to ” 

“To adapt my moral nature to my environment, 
perhaps, as Dr. Griggs advises. Is that what you 
mean?” 

“Um!” stroking his smooth-shaven chin, re- 
flectively. “Well, I don’t know — not exactly. Per- 
haps it is. To teach that which is allowable, you 
know; and not concern yourself too much with — 
with abstract truth.” Mr. Ludington mopped his 
forehead. “Statistics, you know; and — and such 
things.” 

“He set me down in the midst of the valley 
which was full of bones, and caused me to pass by 
them round about; and, behold, there were many 
in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.” 

“Humph! nonsense!” Mr. Ludington dropped 
his eyes, with a gesture of impatience. In his heart, 
though, he felt that Kenneth was right; knew that 
he might have received a comfortable sum from 
the gas company and a permanent position in the 
university had he chosen to teach a lie. But he 
had flaunted it; Mammon thrust its painted face 
into his, and he had snatched off the mask and 
trampled on it, scornfully, without due reverence. 


FAIRY GOD-MOTHERS AGAIN. 281 


Some one had been wanted to teach the blessings 
of private capital, but he — he had taught that the 
private capitalist was a nuisance, no more to be 
tolerated than any other slave-driver or feudal 
baron. 

“Do I understand then, Kenneth, that you mean 
to continue the old way?” 

“Yes. At least I shall not recant. This world is 
scarcely worth a lie, if such be the price of its 
favour. Meanwhile I must find some position that 
will support me. Don’t you know of something 
I could *do, Mr. Ludington — it matters little what?” 

Despite the seeming indifference of his manner, 
the old man detected the appeal in his voice, and its 
urgency; continuing to sit there at his library- 
table pondering over the matter long after Ken- 
neth had departed. Dear me! he thought, was 
Kenneth to walk the streets searching for a chance 
job the same as any other unfortunate clerk out 
of work? Were his life work and studies, efforts 
solely in the cause of greater humanity, to come 
to an inglorious end simply because a group of 
greedy money-getters, of the style of Rockland and 
other purse-proud fools, dared to challenge the 
obvious truth of the scholar’s teachings? Was it 
true, after all, that the law of gravity would be 
challenged and suppressed if the rights of capital 
were risked through its acceptance? 

The old gentleman didn’t know. Such thoughts 
were really quite uncomfortable. He sighed, rose 
from his chair, and went out for a walk. 

The following morning when Kenneth returned 
Mr. Ludington handed him several letters ad- 
dressed to various commercial houses. “I don’t 
know,” he said, “whether these will be of any ser- 
vice. You see, I have very little influence now- 
adays with men who are doing the business of the 


282 


GOD’S REBEL . 


world. In fact, I told you once before that nearly 
all my money is invested in banking — I find it 
safest, on the whole.” 

Kenneth made no answer, and he continued, with 
assurance that was plainly affected. “But now 
I’ve been wondering, since you were here yester- 
day, why you couldn’t do newspaper work. I be- 
lieve you know how to write — on almost any sub- 
ject. At any rate, I own a little stock in one of 
our dailies, and so, as you see, I have taken the 
liberty to give you a letter to the managing edi- 
tor of the Republican 

“The Republican! Good heavens!” 

Mr. Ludington nodded, patiently. “Yes, I know 
its politics are not yours, exactly. Still, you under- 
stand very well that this need make no difference. 
Men on newspapers write as they are paid, not as 
they believe.” 

Kenneth smiled. “As the multifarious Bismarck 
commands,” he assented, yet wondering how the 
old gentleman really had come to this conclusion: 
that newspaper-writers were simply paid liars. How- 
ever, he thanked him, dissembling as best he could; 
was leaving the room when the old man’s voice 
called him back. 

“Kenneth,” he said feelingly, “Kenneth, wait — 
wait a moment! Let us not deceive each other. 
You know, and I know, that there are thousands 
of young men out of work in this city, who can 
find nothing to do — nothing! Well, I want to warn 
you, honestly; I want you to realise that you are 
at a critical point in life. When the world and its 
entire commercial and religious institutions have 
become to one merely a lie, secret, perhaps, but 
yet known — good God! whither shall a man turn 
then? But, my lad, whatever else you do, don’t get 


FAIRY GOD-MOTHERS AGAIN. 283 

discouraged. Good-by. Come and see me — when- 
ever you can.” 

A pressure of the hand, and he was out on the 
street making his way towards Wildwood. Ah, the 
fairy god-mother, he mused; the fairy god-moth- 
er! Would she never have done with her disguises? 
Yet how would the unfortunates of this life subsist 
without her? She it was, obviously, who preserved 
the equilibrium of this world, the eternal “perfectly 
balanced, sir; perfectly balanced!” rather than that 
ignoble pretender, gentle Dr. Little. 

Still musing, he walked the entire distance, ar- 
riving at his home just as a carriage was circling 
in front of the curb. The fairy god-mother must 
have her little play out, he said, smiling, as he rec- 
ognized the turnout. See, it is the princess! 
Whence comes she, from what other world; trans- 
forming everything in the twinkling of an eye. The 
two black beetles dragging that prodigious pump- 
kin are now six milk-white steeds, with coachman 
and footmen, deferent, dumb, caparisoned to at- 
tend a queen. Whilst his own modest home, from 
the garish light of noon w r as now a mansion all 
aglow. Nocturnal arms enfold it; and within, 
music, noble knights and gentle ladies moving to 
the minuet. 

But no; at high noon the warning clock struck 
midnight in his brain. She opened the door of her 
carriage. 

“Look out!” he cried — the noctambulist. — 
“Look out! Don’t lose your slipper!” 

“My slipper!” she exclaimed, looking down in 
sudden dismay as she stood there on the step, skirts 
gathered round her, their variegated colours all un- 
folding like the petals of a rose. “What on earth do 
you mean?” 

He took her hand and helped her down. “I 


284 


GOD'S REBEL. 


didn’t know you were in town. It’s very good in 
you to come away out here, Enid. Yes, Julia is 
home.” 

There was no pressure from his hand. She saw 
only the satirical smile on his face. “Wait! what 
did you mean?” she asked, with wonder at his 
greeting, as they moved towards the house. 

He fumbled with his latch-key and let her in. 
“Nothing,” he said. “If you’ve never heard of any 
one losing a slipper, why then, it’s not worth while 
for — for me to advertise it.” He threw open the 
door. “I’ve been thinking of the fairy god-mother, 
somehow, all this morning.” 

She glanced up as she passed him; the roses 
deepened; the stars behind her veil glowed softly. 
She looked away. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

HER FATAL SLLFPER. 

“Did you see him, Enid? How did he appear?” 

Enid threw aside her wraps, having just returned 
from her drive to Wildwood. “Oh, yes; I saw 
him.” She said no more; seemed strangely 
weary. 

“But is he coming to see me?” Nannette per- 
sisted, glancing up impatiently. “Why, what is 
the matter? Isn’t he well; or didn’t he care to 
see you or — or anyone?” 

Enid shook her head. “No; yes — I don’t know. 
Things have happened so that I don’t seem to un- 
derstand anything, any more — himself least of all. 
Everything is so queer. You ask how he appeared. 
Well, then, do you know how a man acts whose 
chief characteristic ever since boyhood has been 


HER FATAL SLIPPER. 285 

his sincerity, but who suddenly loses the power of 
speaking honestly, seriously, with anyone? Or as 
one who, having lost all the world, should there- 
upon exclaim: ‘Fy! it is nothing; one can do very 
well without it!’ ” 

Nannette’s forehead puckered. “But how would 
you have him act, Enid? Surely you would not 
choose to see him brooding over his misfortunes?’’ 

“Brooding! Of course not. Still, one would 
expect him to speak seriously for two minutes at a 
time, especially when anyone takes interest enough 
in him to ask what he intends doing.” 

“Oh; did you ask?” 

“Y — yes,” stammering an instant at Nannette’s 
directness. “For really, I don’t see how he is going 
to live. You know he has nothing; and of 
course he won’t be able to find another college 
position — not now. Well, I meant merely to prove 
my friendship, but at the faintest hint of any assist- 
ance he protested quickly: 'No, Mrs. Phillips; I 
shall always remember with pleasure your generous 
impulse, but you forget that I have two positions 
waiting for me already.’ ” 

“Dear me! how very fortunate! What were they 
— did he say?” 

Enid bit her lip. “Oh, yes ; he assured me that he 
had every hope of being elected president of the 
Main Street National Bank, or else associate edi- 
tor of the Republican. The choice is simply op- 
tional with himself.” 

Nannette burst into laughter. It was all too pre- 
posterous. “To think of his filling either position !” 
she cried. “You know he declares that a man 
might just as well keep a saloon as run a bank. 
And as for the Republican — but fancy his writing 
that stuff!” 

However, Enid refused to consider it lightly; 


286 


GOD'S REBEL . 


accepted it rather as a slight, wilful and unkind. 
Indeed in the loneliness of her heart she had fallen 
into the way of thinking of him constantly; sympa- 
thising with him openly, moreover, and always 
taking his part despite the fact that nearly all the 
good people of her acquaintance, wealthy neigh- 
bors, fashionable society people and their kind, 
held him directly responsible for the disturbances 
at Wheeling — the discontent with liberal wages, 
the envious sneers directed against themselves and 
other generous stockholders, and lastly the riot, 
numbering several innocent lives in its tragedy, in- 
cluding even her husband’s. 

“To think that she can be so brazen as to dare 
defend that man!” exclaimed Mrs. Simmons, to her 
neighbour Mrs. Adams, hands uplifted in unspeak- 
able horror. “Dear me! and did I never tell you 
that I had actually met him once — why, it was 
right here at your house! He seemed such a nice 
quiet gentleman, too; one would never have taken 
him for an anarchist then, do you think so?” 

“Sh!” Mrs. Adams dropped a lace handkerchief 
between the pages of her novel to mark the place, 
and leaned forward mysteriously — “sh! have you 
forgotten how they were together nearly the whole 
evening?” 

“Sh-shocking!” Mrs. Simmons’ voice vibrated 
strangely between horror and curiosity. “That ac- 
counts for it, I just believe. You know his own 
aunt, Mrs. Mason, told me that he treated his wife 
shamefully — actually drove her away.” 

“Ah,” And Mrs. Adams, now wholly forgetful 
of her novel in this fresher plot, drew her chair 
closer to her caller’s and together they whispered 
it over; how everything had obviously been planned 
between them that very night, at her home, even to 
the strike and the final getting rid of Potiphar, 


HER FATAL SLIPPER . 


287 

Mabel, and whatever other inconvenient obstacles 
stood in their way. “It all reminds me,” simpered 
Mrs. Simmons as she rose to depart, “of what I 
once heard a gentleman say — a literary man, he 
was. ‘Truth, Mrs. Simmons,’ said he, ‘is stranger 
than fiction.’ Now I think that was quite clever, 
don’t you? Good-by; I’ve had such a delightful 
call.” 

To which remarks Enid had lent but a deaf ear; 
catching them only as they came unawares, as the 
unavoidable buzz and sting of that disagreeable 
ephemera which always accompanies the life of 
humid atmosphere and social stagnation, where 
rank growth and strange colours predominate. It 
meant nothing to her that such in general had 
marked him for the butt of their displeasure. She 
was fortunately not dependent on that curious mon- 
ster, the best society, for her estimate of men and 
affairs; had long outgrown the hypocrisy of its 
favour or dislike. She admitted to herself that 
he had been unwise, even quixotic; yet that was 
a very vital form of windmill that he had charged 
against, after all, with power to lengthen 
its arms, and reach out, to crush, and to write its 
own account of the engagement afterward, and 
whisper it on every wind. Aye, it had merely to 
revolve, independent of the grace of God, and it 
could generate its own wind, as any one could see. 
A very vital windmill, in sooth. She could not 
wonder that he had been unhorsed, thrown into a 
dungeon. 

During the summer and fall, accompanied by 
Nannette and her mother she had visited various 
cities and resorts throughout the East, restlessly 
seeking satisfaction in the life around her, but to- 
wards which she at best could feel but a growing 
indifference. A masquerade, the dancers all un- 


288 


GOD'S REBEL. 


masked but still capering — it was growing hid- 
eous; if they had kept their masks on, or turned the 
lights lower. Watching Nannette at work on her 
proof sheets one day she had said, “It must be 
glorious to have work in which you thoroughly 
believe, can put your heart.” And Nannette had 
glanced up, slowly, sweeping the hair back from her 
brow and the eyes that were deep in the mystery 
of other worlds — “Oh, do you think so?” she said. 
“You see, sometimes I think it is nothing but hyp- 
notism. All one has to do is to fix the eye-s in- 
tently on a single object, and, presto! everything 
else vanishes. Now this,” sorrowfully, as she held 
up a sheet, “is only a page of the Rhapsodist. But 
I’ve always wanted to finish that story that Mr. 
Kent and the professor made me stop.” 

“But why should he?” Enid asked after ponder- 
ing a moment. “It seems to me he should have 
preferred you to write in that style.” 

“Who — the professor?” Nannete shook her 
head. “No; in fact I think he hated to involve his 
friends; that he even grew to realise the hopeless- 
ness of his economic reform struggle so far as 
present success was concerned, and that he wished 
at times he had no ties, no close friends — and so 
might be free to fight his own battle.” 

“Nonsense!” This was merely another of his 
quixotic notions, Enid thought, of which he had 
so many, too many, but for which, nevertheless, 
she had always liked him; winning favour that dated 
from childhood, from the time when he had taken 
her beautiful ship out of her hands and sent it 
sailing in the face of the storm out over the lake on 
its way to Africa. Whenever she thought of him 
now that memory always returned, half sadly, yet 
invariably fetching a smile. “Poor Kenneth! he 
should have known better.” 


HER FATAL SLIPPER. 


289 

To the mountain hotel where they were staying, 
one scarlet day in the fall came Mr. Oliver Gold- 
smith-Smith; blithe, and rosy of face, a chubby 
finger caressing anon the dimple it loved so well. 
“Why didn’t you bring Mr. Kent?” they had asked. 
Whereto he had shaken his head, quickly; oh, no; 
it was quite impossible for them both to come away 
at this time of the year; their fall publications must 
be looked after, and the business of the O. G. 
Goldsmith-Smith publishing house had become 
enormous — yes, simply enormous. Besides, he ex- 
plained, Sam never seemed, somehow, to enjoy 
himself save when at work; feared, poor fellow, 
it had become habitual to him, you know. 

“It’s only to be expected that Nature will stunt 
and defraud us at last if we ruthlessly continue to 
put her aside — prevents a well-rounded growth 
and existence. Don’t you think so, Miss Nielsen?” 

Mischief shone in her eyes, and she dropped 
them quickly. “Yes,” she admitted, pensively, 
stroking the petals of a chrysanthemum he had 
given her, “I can easily understand that it might.” 

Howbeit they made him welcome. He fetched 
them news of the town and was invariably good 
company. Indeed if Goldsmith-Smith’s literary ad- 
olescence was wont at times to become a trifle ob- 
trusive, such was quickly forgotten in consideration 
of his pleasing capacity for finding enjoyment in 
most simple things. He could admire without crit- 
icism. The surface of things still enthralled him; 
every column and filigree in nature’s really won- 
drous facade was as dear to his heart as his dimple. 
Together he and Nannette strolled over the hills 
that were then in all their glory of crimson and 
gold; birch and maple and oak were aflame, whilst 
high on the summit the sunlight flooded the maiden 
shoulders of winter. 


19 


290 


GOD'S REBEL . 


“Look! It is her first appearance/’ he cried. “I 
always loved a debutante, Miss Nielsen. All nature 
has woven her gown.” 

She laughed in momentary sympathy. “Indeed, 
she is quite your style, Mr. Goldsmith-Smith; al- 
though rather cold, one would think. Why don’t 
you write her story? But wouldn’t you like to see 
her closer?” 

Oliver agreed, gladly. “Oh, yes, of course I can 
write the story afterwards, you know. Do you 
really think she is cold?” 

“A — ah; it might spoil it,” she replied, with a 
demure little shake of the head. Whereat he 
glanced at her wistfully, and she looked away. 
“Come on;” she added finally. “There’s a car up 
at noon, I believe.” 

The following morning at an early hour, hearing 
the omnibus drive up Enid raised the shade of 
her chamber and glanced out; saw Mr. Goldsmith- 
Smith step into the bus, with glossy silk hat, collar 
of his light overcoat buttoned full to the chin. 
“Why, Nannette, there goes Mr. Smith!” she cried, 
and rapped on the pane. 

He glanced up ; lifted his hat. He did not smile. 
The driver cracked his whip and the horses plunged 
off to the station. 

“Oh, has he gone, Enid?” said Nannette, coming 
to the window. “Dear me! the ground is white 
with frost.” 

Enid looked at her curiously. Had she really 
refused him, she wondered? Poor fellow! Gold- 
smith-Smith was certainly a nice young man, a 
little fresh, perhaps, yet talented and growing, and 
withal he had money. And Nannette — was she not 
even a little bit spoiled by her temporary success 
and renown ? An hour or two later Enid sought her, 


HER FATAL SLIPPER. 


291 

finding her still hard at work on her proof-sheets, 
unaware of her presence ere she spoke. 

“Tell me, dear,” she said, her arm stealing round 
her; “what are you up to? Are you busy marrying 
the Rhapsodist, after all ?” 

Nannette flushed, released her arm quickly and 
rose. “What nonsense!” she cried. “Why, you 
know he would never approve such a thing!” An 
instant she held her ground, eyes flashing indig- 
nantly at the suggestion. “It’s out — outrageous 

that ” her voice broke; turning hastily, she ran 

from the room in confusion. 

So whatever the reasons for her conduct, Nan- 
nette kept them to herself. In her mind's eye, 
maybe, there still lingered a stage picture of that 
strange pantomime between Sam and Oliver at the 
time when she had first called at their office, the 
every significant gesture of which she had seen re- 
flected in a mirror in front of her, but without their 
knowledge. Now there are times when first im- 
pressions are momentous, and when Pelion upon 
Ossa afterwards in all manner of kindness and gra- 
ciousness can occasion its recipient merely an un- 
comfortable sense of weight and oppression, leaving- 
room for scarcely one throb of gratitude or forgive- 
ness. Moreover she had mistaken Sam for the 
proprietor from the first, and nothing had ever hap- 
pened afterwards to destroy her illusion. A 
woman’s heart-judgment is never to be really 
overshadowed by flagrant instances of Fortune’s 
mistakes. Oliver was merely an accident — an in- 
terloper! 

“Sam,” he had said on returning, taking off his 
coat and hanging it on the back of the chair be- 
fore his desk — “Sam, it’s all up. I’ve been an ass,” 
his accents fraught with the profoundest intelli- 
gence. 


2Q2 


GOD'S REBEL. 


“Oh, that’s nothing,” Sam murmured compla- 
cently, ripping open an envelope and unfolding a 
check; “we all have a kinship with that exceedingly 
human creature at times.” He glanced at him 
keenly and went on with his work. The situation 
was embarrassing to him, nevertheless, as no note 
in his tones implied. He wanted to say more, to 
express his sympathy for his friend and speak of 
the cause of his sufferings as she doubtless de- 
served. Nannette shouldn’t have played with him 
so — he was too young! She was so absorbed in 
her stories, in the drama of life behind the curtain, 
that she never would stop to look on or take seri- 
ously the vaudeville always before her. Well, she 
was much to be blamed; no one had any right to 
treat the performers in the “continuous” with such 
reckless and dispassionate indifference. And yet, 
Oliver was greatly to be censured, too. Why should 
he always refuse to look below the surface! After 
all, though, the experience might prove beneficent; 
might even improve his style, he reflected grimly, 
though of course delicacy forbade he should speak 
of it now. 

“Oliver,” he said finally, seeing how his friend 
still sat dreaming before his desk — “Oliver, I’m 
more delighted to see you home again than I may 
have acknowledged. You see, there’s no end of 
work.” 

Oliver roused himself with visible effort, took 
his feet from his desk. “Yes, I know — I know it, 
Sam.” He stood up, drew on his coat. “Well, I’m 
going out just a moment ” 

“Going out! Why, you’ve just ” 

“Oh, yes, I know,” Oliver continued, his hand 
on the door-knob. “But I’m going out just a min- 
ute; shall be back in an hour — two hours at the 
outside. Then you’ll see; I’m going to pitch in,” 


HER FA TAL SLIPPER. 


293 


He threw open the door. “Wait! hold on — going 
down, there! going down!” And he vanished. 

Sam worked on, as usual. With the morning’s 
first mail had come another roll of proof from Miss 
Nielsen. This he always examined with somewhat 
more than a critical interest, yet ever with growing 
wonder at its every marginal mark — as though she 
would put all her life into this one little book! Yet 
whilst he read, ofttimes, the conviction would grow 
strong within him that she was never to write 
anything else, or at least of any account. He had 
often been struck with this same note of subtle 
finality in the first work of new writers that the 
blind world hailed as promising. Sometimes, in- 
deed, it was this pernicious promise that spoiled 
them; nothing ever appearing quite the same to 
their souls afterwards, hence the mirror grew false. 
Not that their books sold no more; oh, no! quite 
the contrary; anything of theirs would sell then, 
after long ceasing to be worth the price. And so 
with her, perhaps. Ah, me, he shuddered, she 
might even have to resort to the historical. Think 
of that, now — the historical! Even now she had 
made alterations in the Rhapsodist that caused him 
to frown as he read. If she were here in the city he 
might warn her, perhaps, reflecting how they had 
already been gone three months. Still, he would 
not write, was decidedly opposed to it; yet if some- 
thing would only happen to bring them home 

He picked up the morning’s paper and began 
searching it hastily. Here it is, he said: “His sen- 
tence commuted;” his first thought being to mark 
the article and mail it; but no, that would never 
do, might even be construed as meddlesome. So 
he merely folded the paper, wrapped and directed 
it, and sat thinking a moment idly. So Professor 
Moore was to be released — next week. How 


294 


GOD’S REBEL. 


strangely it read, the words in cold print! Were 
we living in Russia or the United States, that this 
student of life who had sworn that black was black 
and stuck to it was now about to be released after 
four months’ imprisonment? And would he be the 
same, quite, with a laugh at affairs that was sharper 
than scolding; or would he be vindictive, bitter? 
Would he be more than a man; was ever an organ- 
ism more than the sum of its environmental forces? 
No; he would have fair cause to be bitter, increas- 
ing with every day, perhaps, should he now, as 
was probable, be denied by society the merest right 
to live at all. Hence now, if ever, must those who 
believed in him prove their friendship, their sup- 
port. Realising this, Kent had only the week be- 
fore written a vigorous reply to the tirade of a cer- 
tain capitalist, who had deprecated with horror the 
growing discontent of the populace, who feared an- 
archy, and advised an immediate increase in the 
army for the protection of himself and his kind. 
In his answer to this Kent had for the nonce ceased 
speaking in parable, had declared boldly that the 
only anarchy to be discovered by an intelligent ob- 
server in our social and economic life of to-day was 
the anarchy of capital; had dwelt with considerable 
merriment upon that holy-of-holies known as the 
“common sense” of successful business men; al- 
leging that theirs was not common sense at all, but 
merely common ignorance, which gave rise to their 
absurd assumption that industrial life was station- 
ary; that conditions to-day were as they always 
had been in the past and always must be in the 
future. Thence he went on to speak to the intelli- 
gent business man as to a little child; took him by 
the hand and led him beside great aggregations of 
capital on the one hand and millions of labourers 
half-paid or unemployed on the other. Lifting the 


HER FATAL SLIPPER . 


295 


economic curtain before his unwilling eyes, he had 
closed with that awful word, fraught with the dark- 
est forebodings of evil to follow: Evolution! 

To which Kent had signed his own name, with 
the reflection that, let come what might, the time 
was surely near at hand when men who knew the 
truth and believed as he did should let the public 
know it. The article had appeared in one of the 
more liberal morning papers, and in less than three 
days afterwards had come letters from no less than 
fifty of the subscribers to the Literary Sun ordering 
him to cancel their subscriptions forthwith. Dil- 
ettantes and clubmen, who frankly admitted that 
they had long enjoyed the dazzle and glow of the 
Sun , but who now took issue with its editor, 
squarely; with this Samuel Kent, critic and dream- 
er, the man who wrote wickedly and maliciously of 
industrial evolution, when at heart he meant so- 
cialism pure and simple. The next thing they knew 
he would be sanctioning any new and outrageous 
scheme for defrauding them and picking their pock- 
ets under this knavish and unchristianly pretense 
of evolution. Evolution, forsooth! Which letters, 
of course, Sam had taken infinite pains to keep out 
of Oliver’s hands, fearing to over-excite him. 

At noon he handed the addressed newspaper to 
the postman, and on the second morning thereafter 
Nannette had hastily torn open the wrapper and 
scanned its contents, reading only the headlines 
— how else could one read all that stuff every day? 
Yet at one of them she came to a pause, the paper 
ceased to rustle for an instant. “What is it Nan- 
nette?” Enid asked. At which she had handed 
her the paper, folded close to the heading, “His 
Sentence Commuted.” 

That same afternoon they had started home. 
Yes, now she could go to him, not scrupling to 


296 


GOD'S REBEL. 


show her sympathetic regard, frank support, even 
in the face of society bent to an interrogation point 
of agonising expectancy; could go to him as she 
felt certain he would have been sure to come to 
her were she in trouble — she being weak and he 
strong. But as to the manner of his acceptance 
she had never paused to consider; at any rate not 
till that first meeting — his strange greeting at the 
curb as she alighted from her carriage. Cinderella 
indeed! Though at first she had taken it seriously, 
with pleasure at the implied compliment and hu- 
mourous conceit of his mood. But shortly after- 
ward he had excused himself, leaving her sitting 
there chatting aimlessly with Julia and her husband 
whilst he wandered off for a walk; she had seen 
him go past the window, hands clasped behind him, 
eyes fast on the ground. 

“But what did he say to you, anyway?” Nan- 
nette persisted, as Enid sat there, saying nothing, 
seeming strangely perplexed and disconcerted as 
the result of her call. 

“Well, I told you all he said,” Enid answered, her 
toe tapping the carpet with annoyance. “Or no, 
I forgot,” she subjoined with a laugh as she rose. 
“He told me not to lose my slipper.” 

“Good heavens!” — But Enid had left the room 
and was half-way up the stairs. 


CHAPTER XXV. 

THE RIGHT TO LIVE . 

“Is the president in?” 

Several days had passed ere Kenneth could bring 
himself to the point of presenting those letters 


THE RIGHT TO LIVE . 


297 


given him by Mr. Ludington; not indeed till he 
had called at various other places, seemingly more 
in his line, in the vain search for work, being in- 
variably refused and with scant notice taken of his 
application, had he at last entered the tiled and 
barred and mahogany-stalled room on the main 
floor of one of the largest of the down-town banks, 
and paused at the teller’s window. That individual 
scanned him closely before answering, having re- 
ceived instructions to be always watchful and wary 
of strangers. The world was at warfare; politely, 
of course, in a gentlemanly way, the legions being 
armed with pens rather than halberds; still, the 
generals in command were certainly not lightly to 
be approached in their very tents or headquarters 
without the stranger’s being challenged to see that 
he gave the proper pass-word. 

“Have you a letter, sir?” 

Kenneth felt in his pocket and drew forth sev- 
eral, among them being one with Mr. Ludington’s 
name on the envelope. The teller saw it, and in a 
twinkling every clerk in the room was bowing 
to the floor; he fancied he heard their foreheads 
strike the marble tiling with a click — or was it only 
the gold falling over the counter in a metallic show- 
er? Marvelous anatomy! miraculous anomaly! 
How many of these well-groomed clerks, he won- 
dered, who spent their week-days calculating the 
profits of usury, and their Sundays, some of them, 
in vague awe and respect of Christianity never quite 
understood, ever reminded themselves of that olden 
drama of Christ and the money-lenders at war in 
the temple? Probably not one of them; besides, 
what was the use? Why should young men tor- 
ment their souls nowadays with traditional whis- 
perings of the impracticable Christ ? 

Taking Kenneth’s letter, the chief clerk conduct- 


GOD’S REBEL . 


298 

ed him to the president’s private office, bowed and 
withdrew. “Ah, from Mr. Ludington,” said the 
president, glancing at the envelope ere he unfolded 

the letter. “Please have a seat, Mr. — er — Mr. ” 

He read the letter hastily and rose from his chair. 
“My dear Mr. Moore,” he continued with a smile 
as he pressed the young man’s hand, “I am de- 
lighted to meet you. Any friend of Mr. Luding- 
ton’s is always more than welcome at our office. 
Pray tell me how I can best serve you.” His fore- 
head in turn hit the floor. 

Kenneth flushed. He hadn’t realised that it was 
going to be like this. Why in the deuce hadn’t Mr. 
Ludington explained? The president took him for 
a heavy depositor, he perceived at once, with rising 
mortification as his eyes travelled swiftly over the 
contents of the room and rested a moment on an 
old-fashioned print of Alexander Hamilton — a 
memory that he thoroughly detested, yet invariably 
evoking a counter picture of the now thoroughly 
aroused and conscientious Jefferson speaking in 
terms of no doubtful significancy relative to Ham- 
ilton’s machinations and aristocratic scheming. 
But of course all bankers worshipped Alexander 
Hamilton — he shouldn’t have forgotten that. 

“I have called, he began, steadying himself as 
best he could, “to ask about the bank’s ” 

“Ah, yes, yes; a thousand pardons,” the presi- 
dent interposed, pressing a bell-button, “you wish 
to see a statement first. Perfectly natural, Mr. 
Moore; perfectly natural, I assure you.” A clerk 
entered the office. “Mr. Barnes, please see if the 
morning statement is prepared yet; if not, then 
yesterday’s will suffice” — turning to Kenneth, lips 
parted, eyes starting wide with invitation; “yes- 
terday’s will suffice, I presume, Mr. Moore? Yes 


THE RIGHT TO LIVE . 


299 

— yes, I thought so. Yes, Mr. Barnes, yesterday’s 
will suffice if the morning’s isn’t quite ready.” 

The clerk bowed, “Very well, sir,” and withdrew. 

“You understand, Mr. Moore, we always try to 
have our statement out within an hour after open- 
ing for business every morning,” the president ex- 
plained, dangling his gold eye-glasses a moment 
between himself and this new-found depositor, then 
again placing them on his nose and peering sharply 
at Kenneth as if he would learn whether by any mis- 
chance or too hasty calculation he had placed too 
high an estimate on this modest friend of that 
wealthy old gentleman, Mr. Amos Ludington. 
Howbeit he appeared quite satisfied, consulting his 
watch directly as if impatient at the delay. “I really 
beg your pardon, Mr. Moore, it is now — er — eleven 
o’clock. Yes,” he admitted, though loathfully, 
holding the watch in his hand and rubbing his 
thumb across the crystal, “it is a quarter past. But 
we have been driven to death lately, our clerks are 
all worn out and fairly overworked. Yes, I assure 
you it is overwork, Mr. Moore. No one will suffice 
for this institution who makes a practice of being 
up nights; clubs, theatres, horse-races, no, I assure 
you, sir, such men will never suffice in the world 
for a great banking business like ours. Such habits 
ruin the eye, dull the brain, blunt the conscience, 
all the finer sensibilities are annihilated, utterly an- 
nihilated. But as a matter of record, Mr. Moore, 
you will find that nearly all our clerks are members 
of the Y. M. C. A.; our chief clerk is superintendent 
of the Sunday-school in the Park Avenue Presby- 
terian Church. You observed, of course, that they 
are a fine-looking and intellectual lot of young men; 
a most exemplary set, sir, and they — er — generally 
suffice for all the strain that we are capable of put- 
ting upon them; that is, sir, that is to say — ah, 


300 GOD'S REBEL . 

here’s the statement. Is it this morning's Mr. 
Barnes?” 

Mr. Barnes bruised his forehead: “Yes, your 
Majesty,” and backed out. 

The president took the statement and adjusted 
his glasses: “Now here we have ” 

“But, sir,” Kenneth protested, “I fear I am tak- 
ing up too much of your time, and inasmuch ” 

“Oh no, no, not in the least, Mr. Moore, I am en- 
tirely at your service,” he insisted. Ah, his cus- 
tomer was getting wary, didn’t like their looks, 
perhaps; but he must hold him. He was a friend 
of Mr. Ludington’s. The statement would doubt- 
less fix him all right. “On the contrary, Mr. 
Moore, I must apologise for detaining you,” he 
continued, smiling obsequiously. “But this state- 
ment will explain everything. Here you see it: 
Resources and Liabilities. Item: time-loans on 
security, three millions; three-two-five-naught-nine- 
eight, and sixty-seven. Item: bonds — mostly gov- 
ernment, sir — two millions, seven-nine-four-two- 
seven-three, and twenty-two. Item: cash on hand, 
one million, eight-nine-eight-five-one-four, and one 
cent. But you see how it runs, Mr. Moore. It’s a 
pretty statement, now, isn’t it, sir — one that should 
fairly suffice for any institution?” 

“Why, yes, sir, as far as my judgment goes,” 
Kenneth stammered modestly; “but I merely called 
to see if you were in need of any more help?” 

“More help?” echoed the president; “I don’t 
understand, Mr. Moore. Of course we always wel- 
come a new depositor, but — but you can see we are 
in no immediate fear of any financial stringency, sir. 
A little flurry last summer, perhaps, but everything 
is all right now. No, sir, I think I may safely say 
that we are in need of no help, Mr. Moore.” 

Kenneth was getting desperate, beginning to feel 


THE RIGHT TO LIVE . 


301 


lost and ashamed; that native manliness that had 
so inspired the president to unbosom himself upon 
his entrance was beginning to desert him. “But I 
mean, sir,” he objected, “help among the clerks; 
do you need any more bookkeepers, or — or any- 
thing? I want a position.” 

“Oh — ” the president gasped, dropping back in 
his chair. 

Would his infernal astonishment never cease? 
Kenneth wondered. How small he seemed in the 
sight of all these monumental figures! Why, he was 
not as big as that poor little penny at the bottom 
of the “Cash on Hand!” Still, the bank did a large 
business, the president had just been boasting of it, 
admitting that his clerks were driven to death and 
overworked. Yes, they surely must need more 
help. 

“Let me see,” said the president, recovering, 
“what did I do with Mr. Ludington’s letter?” He 
searched the papers on his desk, found it, and 
again perused it hastily, a frown on his face as he 
looked up. “My mistake, Mr. Moore,” he re- 
marked curtly. “You must be a very dear friend 
of his from the way he refers to you. But have 
you ever done any work in a bank?” 

The young man confessed that he had not. 

“Then I fear,” continued the president, directly, 
that it will be impossible for us to — to use you in any 
way. You see, our men always start in as boys, 
from the age of fourteen to sixteen, and grow up 
with us. It would scarcely be fair, consequently, for 
us to employ an outsider. For this reason, I may 
say that we never have a position open to a man 
of your age.” 

Kenneth said nothing, wondering if it could be 
possible that his economic value to society, at the 


302 


GOD’S REBEL . 


age of thirty, was actually less than a boy’s at the 
age of fourteen. 

The president rose. “Yes, that’s the way it is, 
Mr. Moore,” he began briskly, his manner imply- 
ing regret at the moments already wasted as he 
busied himself with the papers held in one hand, 
including the morning statement; but once more 
recollecting that auspicious introductory letter, he 
subjoined, apologetically, “Though of course if 
Mr. Ludington should insist, you know, if he 
should really insist we might possibly create a posi- 
tion of some sort.” Whereupon Kenneth thanked 
him, remarking, however, that he didn’t think Mr. 
Ludington would insist; in fact, he knew he 
wouldn’t. 

“Well, come in and see me again, Mr. Moore, I 
shall always be pleased to talk with you. Give my 
kindest regards to Mr. Ludington. Good-morn- 
ing;” and the president resumed his duties, wholly 
unconscious of the fact that he belonged to that 
self-sufficient set who argued on every occasion 
that there was no use of any young man being out 
of work who really wanted it. That idea was the 
merest rant of blatant demagogues. There was 
plenty of work; let the young man look elsewhere! 

Kenneth had letters to three other bank presi- 
dents; one of which he presented with a similar re- 
sult, save that the man was not so courteous. Mr. 
Ludington’s deposit or stock, possibly, was a little 
below par at present. Still, all their men started as 
boys; there was absolutely no chance for him 
there. And so it was with the remaining banks, 
where he inquired merely at the first window but 
always to meet with the same refusal. At the sixth 
bank he quit, seized with despair, agreeing at last 
that he was too old; there was plainly no hope for 


THE RIGHT TO LIVE , . 


303 

an old man like him to become a banker. He must 
look elsewhere. 

“I’m not sure, Kenneth,” Holden had objected 
as his friend came home bringing report of his fail- 
ure to find an opening — ‘Tm not sure but you 
are making a great mistake by wasting your time in 
searching. After all, you can’t blame the bankers, 
you know, nor other business men; nearly all their 
employes do start as boys, and anyway your train- 
ing has been so different that it makes it utterly im- 
possible for you to find work as a clerk. Why don’t 
you just sit down and wait, write magazine arti- 
cles, prepare a text-book, or do anything! Things 
will come your way again after awhile, you know.” 

Kenneth shook his head. If Holden were rich, 
he conceded that such a course might be fairly en- 
durable; feeling in truth that someday he would 
be back in college, teaching, and lecturing pub- 
licly. Even now one perceived that he had not 
been so very far ahead of the day, as various cities 
throughout the country were framing new charters 
in the line of municipal ownership, thus proving, as 
he had long contended, that as economic relations 
multiplied with our growth and development, so 
too must the state and municipality keep pace in a 
constantly widening sphere of usefulness, seeking 
ever the greatest benefit to the greatest number. 
Still, Kenneth knew that he was for the present 
persona non grata; his refusal of a position at the 
hands of every large university was enough to 
prove this; and as for trying to subsist on the 
fruits of magazine articles, such, of course, was im- 
possible. For who would care to read what he had 
to say, and where was the magazine so free of cap- 
italistic taint and corruption as to dare publish an 
article by a man who swore up-and-down that pov- 
erty was not designed by God? And if not by God, 


3°4 


GOD’S REBEL. 


in an alleged cursed and unfruitful world, then by 
whom? Once indeed he had made answer to this 
insistent query through the columns of a well- 
known magazine, but this was before the strike and 
his subsequent dismissal from the Rockland Uni- 
versity. For this article he had received in payment 
a check for fifty dollars; had consequently followed 
it up with another — which was promptly returned 
with thanks. Even yet well-known economists of 
the orthodox faith were busy disproving his falla- 
cies, maintaining in magazine and newspaper that 
poverty, like hades, was designed by God, and that 
none save a heretic would ever have dared to ques- 
tion it and its manifest beneficences! 

“No, Henry, there’s no use in my trying to live 
that way,” he replied finally. “I’m not in the hu- 
mour for writing and nothing of mine would sell 
now anyway. So I must find something else to 
do temporarily, it matters little what. After all, 
there are enough places I could fill if I had them — 
don’t you think so?” 

“Oh, if you had them, doubtless,” his friend was 
forced to agree. “But there’s the rub. You know 
there are hundreds of clerks out of work the same 
as other people. How are you to find what they 
can’t?” 

Howbeit he kept on seeking, would take no re- 
buff or refusal; that same pugnacious spirit that 
had pervaded his work in the university now 
buoyed him up as he walked the streets in search 
of a job. He found, besides, as he had protested 
to Holden, that there were innumerable positions 
that he might have filled competently, to the satis- 
faction of any employer, could he only have had the 
chance to apply his labour. Day after day he made 
the rounds of factories, stores, and buildings where 
labour was employed; answering advertisements at 


THE RIGHT TO LIVE. 


305 


night, and starting out early each morning only to 
find himself one of a crowd of from fifty to a hun- 
dred young men standing in line every morning for 
that much coveted yet unattainable position. And 
even here he learned that nine-tenths of the posi- 
tions advertised were only out-and-out fakes — 
“agencies” and schemes for selling everything, 
from books to real-estate, to people who wanted 
neither, with the promise of a most seductive com- 
mission in return; frauds for the profitable fleecing 
of the young man from the country alone in the city 
in search of a job, calling regularly in answer to the 
standing advertisement : 

“Young man wanted who can loan his employer five 
hundred dollars and take a position in splendid business at 
seventy-five dollars a month; money fully secured.” 

It took time, of course, and some little test of good 
temper ere he had caught on to all those innumerable 
pitfalls for the unwary, who, forced to have work, 
were driven headlong by their very necessities into 
parting with that little money which they could so 
ill afford to lose, and in schemes so bare-faced and 
preposterous as to make them feel themselves fools 
for years afterward. This business, naturally, 
constituted a large source of revenue to the Repub- 
lican and other first-class papers that filled their col- 
umns and whole pages with such advertisements; 
reminding Kenneth more forcibly every day that 
there was no iniquity under the sun but had its 
basis in our false economics, that wherever there 
was profit to be made would fraud and dishonesty 
be found invariably — the larger the profits the 
greater the fraud, that was all, and the more costly 
the cloak chosen to cover it! Newspapers, peers 
of the realm, ministers of the gospel, they were all 
for sale to the highest bidder to advertise anything 


3°6 


GOD’S REBEL . 


from a patent medicine or rotten bicycle tire up to 
the last great “trust/’ as recent revelations had 
proved. “Dishonesty is the life of trade, Henry,” 
he had sighed one night on returning. 

Holden shook his head. “We are living on the 
face of a volcano. Some day there’ll be an erup- 
tion.” 

But he smiled incredulously. “No, that’s what 
I used to think; but it’s a mistake after all. Do 
you remember how we saw people living on the 
slopes of Vesuvius? Well, I don’t suppose they 
would live anywhere else for the world. They are 
used to it; when the panic or crisis comes they give 
way inch by inch, keeping their toes fairly on the 
line of lava, then settle down again same as before. 
So it goes.” 

At the larger stores and factories where he ap- 
plied it was only after the greatest persistency 
that he was able to speak with the managers at 
all. Men seeking work had become an intolerable 
nuisance, they gave him to understand, and gen- 
erally with the subjoinder that they had really never 
known a time when there were so many tramps 
knocking round! “Why, it’s something perfectly 
awful the way they come, you know,” one clerk had 
said to him after hearing his business. To which 
he agreed that it was, left his name and address, 
and went on. At the huge department store of 
Moses, Jones and Co., wdiere the hawk-faced He- 
brew of myth and legend sat cheek-by-jowl with 
his Yankee partner, he found a guard stationed 
before the manager’s office who returned always the 
same answer that no more help was wanted — and 
that anyway they preferred children. 

So the November days came on dark and 
dour; the little money that he had was gone, and 
as for continuing to live at the expense of Holden, 


THE RIGHT TO LIVE. 


307 


this, he felt, was impossible. He knew that his 
friend had not collected a dollar since settling in 
Wildwood, and that his outlook, aside from a little 
money saved out of his Wheeling practice, was 
fully as precarious and unpromising as his own. 
Moreover he always felt a sense of blame and re- 
gret when thinking of the physician, holding it 
largely his fault that his friend had been made to 
pay forfeit in this manner by taking part with the 
workmen at Wheeling. He should have kept his 
friends out of his battles, he thought, resolving in 
future to have no more entanglements; knowing 
the world to be so constituted that no man could 
afford to tell the truth where men’s money is in- 
vested, without risking the gravest penalties for his 
temerity. More than ever, then, was he spurred 
to find some means by which he could keep their 
little household alive until Holden could again 
acquire practice. Yet when all was told he was be- 
ginning at last to despair. At first the city had 
seemed so large and there was so much work in 
progress around him that it scarcely seemed plausi- 
ble he should find nothing at all to do. But grad- 
ually he perceived his opportunities growing nar- 
rower; those innumerable places that had once 
seemed available to him, in the simplicity of his 
inexperience, had all been searched and found hope- 
less — some one was already there. He still contin- 
ued to call, however; had gone to Kent, even, and 
obtained letters of introduction to various publish- 
ers and book-sellers; but only to meet everywhere 
with the same persistent refusal. Now and then, 
it is true, some one kinder than common would 
take his application and sympathetically advise him 
to “drop in again about Christmas;” the mere men- 
tion of that propitious period, season of angels 
and anglers, of costly presents and goodly profits, 


GOD’S REBEL. 


308 

wherein the robber delights to give up to the 
robbed for a day, with a turkey from the meat-trust, 
a ton of coal to the pauper from the coal-trust, and 
the like, midst the glare of churches and the chant- 
ing of “O night divine when Christ was born!” 
— the mere mention of that period causing him to 
feel, somehow, a momentary gladness, vague sense 
of relief and security, but which was suddenly ex- 
tinguished on again seeking the street as being 
simply a passing glimpse of that persistent ghost 
that shadows one and plays irresponsible pranks 
with the understanding long after the red sub- 
stance of superstition has burned to a dull ash 
in the mind. Till at last he came not only to feel 
but to know, beyond question — when all his soul was 
a-sob with the shame and the pain of it — that there 
was no such thing as an available position for him or 
other men out of work in that city ; and that should 
one man now and then succeed in finding something 
to do, such would be but the merest freak, the ex- 
ception that proved the rule in this industrial 
chaos where men perforce had no opportunity to 
work for themselves but must first seek and beg 
and even starve until they chanced to find a mas- 
ter who wanted them for his own profit and would 
generously allow them a small portion of the pro- 
duce of their labour whereby to live in the mean- 
time. And thinking of it so he would often recall 
those plans which he had meant to put into effect, 
what time this reality was only a studied yet con- 
scientious conviction instead of being, as now, a 
thing of too pressing experience; plans for the 
starting of municipal industries, factories, farms, 
training-schools, the elaboration of the idea already 
proved practicable in many a municipal potato- 
patch ; where any man, woman or child that wanted 
it could find a comfortable home and employment 


THE RIGHT TO LIVE. 


309 


for a day or a life-time. But no, he had been 
thwarted; every employer of labour had opposed 
such a scheme as tending to put an end to the 
army of unemployed and so likely to raise the rate 
of wages to a ruinous degree; opposed it the same 
as they had fought against convict labour and prod- 
uce, which they admitted to be a good thing for 
the convicts as teaching them useful trades, but 
a disastrous thing to themselves. Aye, the old, 
old story of industrial warfare, the victors eternally 
opposing any and all measures looking towards 
peace, with the selfish prevision that peace must at 
last necessitate their own unconditional surrender. 
Even the one benevolent individual whom he had 
depended upon the most had looked askance at the 
idea and finally deserted him; had made over his 
hundred thousand of dollars to the Rockland Uni- 
versity, thus helping to equip a telescope whereby 
students might calmly study the stars whilst men 
went on starving round him. 

In spite of this, he had to adjust himself to the 
order of things as existing; had not even the right 
to complain, much less rebel or become mutinous 
to the point of doing nothing. It was his part to 
act, to prove his right to live, his fitness, perchance, 
even in the midst of things hated and scorned. So 
again he read over the advertisements of “men 
wanted,” calling at various places and resolving at 
last, after much earnest persistency on the part of 
the proprietor, to try his hand selling a new-fangled 
mop-handle. It purported to be the “finest thing 
on the American market,” as was seductively set 
forth in a printed prospectus which he was to learn 
and commit to memory, repeating as he called from 
door to door. It sold — the mop-handle — for two 
dollars, half of which he was to keep as commis- 
sion. Several of the agents had sold as many as 


3io 


GOD'S REBEL . 


six in one day, so the proprietor alleged, with the 
implication that any active young man could do as 
well or even better. Whereupon Kenneth had 
decided that he would work half a day at a time 
and make three dollars, which would be ample for 
him and allow him to put the remainder of the 
day on work he had planned for himself. 

“Our agents always pay for the handles as they 
take them,” observed the proprietor in a business- 
like fashion. “One dollar, please. Thank you — 
here’s your receipt. We hope you will be success- 
ful.” 

Kenneth picked up the thing and passed out. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

THE VARIETY-SHOW. 

“Good heavens! what are you doing with that?” 

Having spent the morning soliciting customers 
for that matchless mop-handle, albeit without suc- 
cess, he was passing through the park seeking ter- 
ritory beyond, which was peopled with a class 
dwelling in flats, and who, he hoped, might be 
more favourably disposed toward his “goods” than 
the wealthy folk along the boulevards whence he 
had just come, when he perceived coming towards 
him a victoria containing two young women. Un- 
fortunately for himself, they had recognised him 
first, as he went trudging on, eyes bent to the 
ground and fraught with reflections the strangest 
and most unusual; giving him no time to turn 
about, to run, to pitch that malevolent mop-han- 
dle into the nearest lagoon, and so be able to meet 
the challenge in their salute with all the strength 


THE VARIETY-SHOW. 


3li 

and resistance of manhood surprised but defiant. 
Recovering himself as best he could, therefore, he 
replied, toying the while with the elegant nickel- 
plated clamp on the end of the handle — 

“What! with this? Oh, I’m about to mop out 
the Augean stables.” 

Enid glanced at Nannette, who bit her lip, then 
burst into unavoidable laughter. Enid frowned. 
“Dear me! I hoped you were done with that sort of 
thing, Kenneth!” she exclaimed, between compas- 
sion and indignation. 

He shook his head. “Oh, no, not at all. Indeed 
I’ve only fairly begun this morning. I believe this 
thing will do the business all right — don’t you? 
By the way, what is your day at home? I’m com- 
ing to sell you one before long. Positively the 
finest thing on the American market, with improve- 
ments not to be found on any other handle; all of 
which are fully protected by patent, and people 
selling or using the same will be prosecuted to 
the fullest extent of the law. Please note, lady, how 
the clamp ” 

“Oh stop!” cried Nannette. “How much is it, 
professor?” 

“Only two dollars, lady,” he persisted, ignoring 
the title she had long given him by habit. “Only 
two dollars, one of which goes to me and the other 
to the mop-handle.” 

Enid caught the flash in his eye as he paused, 
satirical still, but with no answering light in her 
own. Something rose in her throat instead, and 
stuck there, robbing the scene of its poor pretense 
at humour and leaving him standing before her 
more nearly as he was — bitter, chagrined, discour- 
aged, and withal shabbily pathetic. Was it possi- 
ble, she asked herself swiftly, that he could find 
nothing better to do than that? Though the 


312 


GOD’S REBEL . 


'only reply she gave him was, — with a nod of the 
head, and something tell-tale yet sweetly memora- 
ble about the mouth — “Very well; call to-morrow, 
please/’ and drove on. 

| He followed the drive in its winding course 
'through the park, slowly; near the entrance of 
jone of the boulevards he found a deserted settee 
jwhere he paused to rest for a moment. It was early 
,in the afternoon of one of the first warm days in 
[November; the sunlight slanted through bare 
branches and lit for an instant a tiny plot near 
him where the grass was again growing green, mis- 
taking the oncoming winter for spring. It caught 
his fancy. Even nature has its little mistakes to 
answer for, he reflected; and it was false, that non- 
sense of Shakspere’s that we were all actors — 
^every tender blade of grass gave it the lie! Some 
people, it is true, could deny the Force that sur- 
rounded them and pass through life unresponsive 
and unlistening, hence were actors truly enough; 
yet others there were who moved always in obedi- 
ence to this Force, reckless of consequences. Well, 
he was not prepared to say which was preferable, 
wholly; but at any rate he felt strangely drawn 
towards that little life-mirroring spot of green grass. 
It had made a mistake; should have refused to 
come up. Winter would nip it anon, and it was 
powerless to protect itself. Actors, forsooth ; What 
Shakspere needed in his philosophy was more 
biology and less sentiment. Still, all men might 
have to learn to be actors, he granted, in order to 
live at all; perhaps that was what the poet meant. 
But if so it was nothing to boast of or repeat, 
surely. 

The usual afternoon parade, to be expected on 
any pleasant day, was beginning to pass; luxurious 
coaches and fashionable turnouts swept by him; in 


THE VARIETY-SHOW. 


313 


one of which was a party of four, vis-a-vis, three 
pretty women whom he observed, thinking at first 
that he knew them, and a man of swarthy com- 
plexion, carefully trimmed Van Dyke, bright eyes, 
withal rather striking. He fancied he had met him 
also. And then — why, of course, it was Professor 
Cline, who had succeeded him in the Rockland 
University as professor of sociology, and, having 
lately returned from abroad, had startled the lis- 
tening world through an interview contained in 
the Republican to the effect that the cause of so- 
cial democracy was rapidly dying out in Germany 
and other European countries! Kenneth recalled 
the contempt with which he had read the lie at 
the time. Professor Cline’s salary had been dou- 
bled, he understood. Turning, he watched the 
party drive on, with its lean immaculately conceived 
coachman and ridiculous fat little footman in glove- 
fitting breeches. The carriage presently descended 
a slight grade and the horses directly disappeared, 
then the carriage — all save the box; leaving the 
fat little footman hovering there for a moment as 
though floating jauntily in mid-air. There were 
three deep transverse wrinkles in the back of his 
plutocratic neck where his coat collar left off and 
his silk hat began. Kenneth counted them disap- 
pear, “one, two, three,” with a laugh. “Rapidly 
dying out,” he sighed once more half aloud. 

But no, such was not the spirit to view it, his place 
at present was to learn to accept things as they were ; 
nay, more, to find some 

(( Como te va, senor. Celebro mucho de verte.” 

He turned; someone had approached along the 
gravel walk at his side, yet so silently, or so ab- 
sorbed had he been, that he was unaware of the 
presence of any one near till the lisping syllables 
saluted him. Glancing up, he discovered with sur- 


3 I 4 


GOD'S REBEL . 


prise, that was not unalloyed with pleasure, that 
the speaker was old Pedro. “Won’t you sit down?” 
he asked, returning his greeting, and adding as 
the old man murmured his thanks and complied: 
“Well, how do you find business nowadays?” 

Whereupon Pedro protested, with some little dif- 
ficulty between his Spanish and English, that busi- 
ness, on the whole, was fair, that he had nothing to 
complain of ; which caused the young man at his side 
to scrutinise him with a moment’s amused curiosi- 
ty, remembering what Goldsmith-Smith had once 
said about seeing old Pedro hauled up at the police 
court charged with receiving stolen goods. He 
was still thinking of this, abstractedly, when the old 
man interrupted his reflections by reminding him 
of his mop-handle, and querying, with now equal 
curiosity on his part, what Kenneth was doing 
with that! 

“Oh, with that?” he answered honestly. “Why, 
then, I’m selling it, Pedro — selling it. Do you 
happen to know any one who wants to buy one?” 
subjoining, with the morning’s effort and training, 
“Positively the finest thing on the American mar- 
ket.” Whereat the old man smiled, thought he 
was jesting and refused to believe it. At last, how- 
ever, he was convinced. “Caramba!” he cried, 
with sudden indignation; and directly, in spontan- 
eous access of sympathy, which struck his com- 
panion as being an amusing yet characteristic in- 
stance of the emotional generosity of the Latin, he 
cried: 

“Listen, senor! I have money — more than I 
wish. Ask any one — they will tell you Pedro has 
money!” 

Kenneth shook his head, rose abruptly from the 
seat. The old beggar’s solicitude and charity, de- 
spite the humour, seemed scarcely fitting or agree- 


THE VARIETY-SHOW. 


315 


able. That he should be reduced to prompting 
gifts from a beggar! Had he really become as 
shabby and helpless as all that, and did his very ap- 
pearance proclaim it — to all the world? But not- 
ing how the old man’s face darkened with disap- 
pointment, hurt, perhaps, at his rudeness, he an- 
swered: “No Pedro; I’m much obliged, I’m sure. 
But I don’t need any money. I’m just selling this 
thing for fun, for experience, you know. Good-by; 
I must walk on.” 

“No? But wait, senor!” An instant’s surprise, 
credulity even, and the old man had risen, caught 
him by the sleeve. “Sientese!” he beseeched. 
“Senor, I swear it, by the holy Virgin, the money 
is as honest as any money ever made in Chicago!” 

The vehemence of the protest, as well as the 
curious aptness of the comparison chosen, fairly 
swept Kenneth off his feet; yielding good-natured- 
ly to the old fellow’s pressure, he again sat down, 
answering the while, with a laugh: 

“Believe me, Pedro, I do not doubt it; I admit, 
on general principles, that your money is fully as 
honest as — as any ever made in Chicago. But I 
tell you I don’t want it — can’t use it. Do you 
understand?” Meanwhile the fear galloped through 
his mind that possibly the old man had gone crazy; 
men in general did not give away their money 
like this, in momentary compassion for every un- 
fortunate young fellow found selling a mop-han- 
dle. 

Yet for a few moments he sat there, listening 
curiously, whilst the old man talked on. A pecu- 
liar tale, and erratic; but replete with adventure, 
experience, wherein he attempted still to prove, de- 
spite appearances to the contrary, that his business 
and its emoluments were fully as honest, though 
possibly not as legitimate, as any other. Once, 


GOD’S REBEL . 


316 

indeed, he had been engaged in a straightforward 
and reputable business on first coming to America 
many years ago, but out of which he was delib- 
erately swindled by one of those legitimate tricks so 
common to the industrial world — world wherein 
success or defeat in general is confessedly inde- 
pendent of skill, devotion, or diligence, or any qual- 
ity whatsoever higher than merest haphazard 
chance or chicanery. Losing his money, therefore, 
Pedro had been obliged to sell himself to a padrone, 
leaving his wife to get along as best she could in 
an ignorant, helpless way in the midst of an in- 
hospitable society. God, perhaps, would take care 
of her, even as he takes care of others. Which 
means that when Pedro had at last purchased his 
freedom his wife had died of starvation; and he 
and his daughter were upon the street making a 
scanty living as street-musicians. Eventually the 
girl too had left him — there had been times when 
he drank and abused her. 

Aye, a worthless fellow enough, Kenneth pon- 
dered; yet was there still an undeniable trace of 
nobility in the old man, a spark inherited from 
birth, perchance, thence backward along a noble 
line to the earliest Aryan fathers. For he was not 
a Spaniard, he had declared proudly, but a Basque; 
one of that race whose fathers had fought under 
the generals of freedom all the way from Hannibal 
to Wellington, had cut to pieces the flank of Charle- 
magne’s army; and when Caesar had sent his con- 
quering legions into their liberty-loving country 
had not Crassus, his lieutenant, reported: “A few 
petty people higher up in the mountains did not 
make their submission and sent no hostages.” 

A half an hour later Kenneth was again hurry- 
ing along the crowded downtown streets of the 
city, but with mind finally resolved and convinced. 


THE VARIETY-SHOW. 


317 


All the way in on the street-car, old Pedro’s story 
had clung to him, somehow, with its parody of 
struggle and apathy, defeat and success, honour 
and fraud, peddling and plundering. Yet coming 
as it did to his economic eye, he could do no less 
than admit that Pedro was very much as other men, 
after all. He was merely an actor, with no more 
power than the average to choose the role he 
would perform whatever might be his inclinations: 
tragedians, comedians, and parody-clowns, the 
scholar, the financier, and the preacher, what one 
of them all could say, “I shall select my own lines 
and recite them as my conscience impels.” Alas! 
not one; and what was worse, people were ceasing 
to expect that the variety-show should have any 
honesty. It was run for profits, the actors ad- 
mitted it every one who had the least vestige 
of reason or honour. And so, at last, with him- 
self, he now saw that if he were to go through 
life at all it must be in the guise of the actor. He 
must learn the lines that society set for him — 
whilst that thing which fools call Fate continued 
to pull the string! — speaking them on all occa- 
sions; never saying one honest word outside of 
that inner circle of his midmost soul; must con- 
ceal his every scientific sociologic conviction as 
best he could. It was all part of that destined 
drama of his life; in time, perhaps, he should be- 
come a great actor — a great tragedian ; or at least be 
able to command a salary sufficient to assist for 
awhile those whom his own friendship and poor act- 
ing had embarrassed. And again Mabel’s words 
swept over him, words that had hurt him more than 
he would ever confess to a living soul. “Oh, Ken- 
neth, you have ruined rny life!” Yes, he had done 
so; and simply by refusing to perform his part in 
the hated variety-show. Though once, but a few 


GOD’S REBEL. 


3i8 

months back, he would have protested stoutly 
against this judgment as held by the world in 
general; could see himself even now standing on 
every street corner in turn, greeted with satirical 
laughter whilst he impotently lifted his voice to 
explain, that No ! the wind was the cause of his 
misfortunes, not himself. Fool! Was the dead 
leaf caught up by the storm to protest that it had 
no wings, when any fool could see that it flew like 
a bird in the air? 

A beggar, gray-whiskered, one-legged, ragged, 
the very essence of the world’s misery and economic 
disease, — world that first maimed and then cast him 
out, and now sweeping past flaunting its iniquity 
in his dead soul’s face, — sat squat on the sidewalk 
at one of the splendid department store corners. In 
his hand was a small tin cup, feebly clasped; yet 
he uttered no word, no moan — the sight of him being 
his sole solicitation. Kenneth felt in his pocket in- 
stinctively, but found nothing, gasped in helpless 
despair, and hurried on. 

Coming to the corner where stood the Repub- 
lican building, he paused a second, then entered 
and asked to see the managing-editor, and was 
shown to a room on the third floor. Here he 
handed the office-boy the letter of introduction 
given him several weeks ago by Mr. Ludington, 
waited a few moments, and was presently ushered 
into the sanctum. 

“Ah, you are Mr. Moore; Professor Moore, I 
believe?” The managing-editor held out his hand 
with ready cordiality, causing Kenneth to won- 
der an instant at its pressure, at the man’s affability, 
especially as the inconvenient recollection just then 
swept over him that this pleasant-voiced being was 
the same who had once referred to him — a year 
ago, perhaps — as “that addle-pated demagogue 


THE VARIETY-SHOW. 


319 


and aberrant abolitionist.” — “Mr. Ludington states 
that you would like to try your hand at editorial- 
writing?” 

Kenneth nodded, gravely. “Yes, I think so; 
that is, if there is any opening where you could 
use me.” 

For answer the editor glanced at him swiftly, 
immediately hitching his chair a trifle nearer his 
caller, the muscles of his face relaxing agreeably 
as he began to speak in low-toned assurance, his 
manner implying already the most felicitous con- 
fidence and understanding. “You see, Professor 
Moore, a great newspaper can always use a strong 
writer. Now I am perfectly aware what your views 
are, and I want to tell you this, frankly, that when 
a man goes to work on a newspaper he must un- 
derstand that he has conveyed all rights in his in- 
tellect and such persuasive powers as he may have 
to the corporation that pays his wages. Why, look 
at me; I am managing-editor of this paper, yet 
I really have no right whatever to express my own 
honest convictions on any matter of public con- 
cern. No; my function is to see, simply, that 
whatever goes into this paper conforms to its pol- 
icy. I suppose you know, of course, that every 
great newspaper or magazine has a policy, a con- 
stitution that must be sustained at all times. Well, 
we who write for the paper do not make this 
policy; it is made for us by the corporation that 
owns us. Do you understand?” 

“Perfectly. The explanation is quite needless,” 
Kenneth assured him. 

The editor smiled. “Very well, I’m glad of that,” 
he continued; for I hated, someway, to have you 
think, as was natural, that newspaper-men are as 
bad as the stuff they write — wanted you to feel, 
you know, that we are merely, for the greater part, 


320 


GOD’S REBEL . 


sometimes clever yet absolutely impersonal and 
ambidextrous automata.” Again Kenneth re- 
called the editor’s penchant for the alliterative a, 
and smiled: Addle-pated amber-haired abolition- 
ist, forsooth! But he knew the source of it now, 
and for an instant it was unction to his soul to 
have added unto it the originator’s own depreca- 
tory description of himself — one of a class of ab- 
solutely impersonal and ambidextrous automata! 
Impersonal? Yes, the editor’s manner left no 
doubt of that; and as if divining his thoughts, he 
proceeded: “You doubtless remember that we 
have had occasion to refer to you a few times in 
the past, Mr. Moore. Well, it is perhaps only fair 
’to say that nearly every man in this office agrees 
with you. We see so much of the lie, you know, 
in everything, that we are all social heretics. How- 
ever, I have no one at present who is able to 
furnish me the leaders I need in sociology. I have 
been looking out for such a writer for some time; 
I believe you could do the work.” Hesitating a 
moment, he added, squarely: “For example, now, 
I want a strong article of say one thousand words 
for to-morrow’s issue, showing the fallacy of munic- 
ipal ownership. Do you think you could write it 
at once?” 

No need to answer that! A man in his position 
could write anything, and at once. Being assigned 
to a desk, he wrote out his manuscript steadily, 
sheet after sheet, his tongue in his cheek the while. 
It was really quite fascinating, such work; leaving 
as it did, for one as well-versed as himself, such 
boundless scope for wit and play of satire. The 
fallacies of municipal ownership! Who, indeed, 
could speak of them as logically and forcibly as 
himself? He had only to begin, naturally, with 
the traditional and monarchical assumption that 


THE VARIETY-SHOW. 


321 


the masses were all fools — such as were not all ras- 
cals. Hence they — the fools — would never be fit 
to run their own business for themselves; and ac- 
cordingly, railroads, street-cars, telephones, gas, 
and the like, would never be so well conducted 
as when presided over by millionaire figure-heads 
drawing enormous salaries. Showed how that 
thing which demagogues called industrial evolu- 
tion was the merest myth, the dream of the anar- 
chist, tending to upset all our time-honoured insti- 
tutions — he didn’t forget that! Proved with in- 
finite humour how certain college professors were 
merely seeking a little cheap notoriety, and in 
reality feathering their own nests whilst pretending 
to teach sociology — in fact he knew several whose 
nests had been so feathered. Spoke of the danger 
of socialism, not failing to show that every step 
in the way of municipal ownership was obviously 
in the direction of socialism — which could never 
be tolerated by the free American people. 

When it was all finished, he read it over, critical- 
ly, reversing a sentence here and there where he 
had inadvertently told the truth from long habit, 
and made it a thing of consistency, that should meet 
the policy of the Republican. Then for awhile he 
sat there, gazing at the thing satirically between 
half-closed eyes; wondering one moment how he 
could have written it, and the next if there were 
any way by which he could possibly make it strong- 
er. And as he sat there reflecting, the discord- 
ant sounds from the street below wailed up to him. 
It was growing dark. He arose, stepped to the 
window and glanced out. The rain had begun to 
drizzle, the November rack floating in from the 
lake and enveloping the city in its clinging gray 
mantle, wherethrough the lights shone glimmering. 
And down below, people whose forms took on the 


322 


GOD'S REBEL. 


same glare and varnished appearance, groped in 
and out, in and out. Across the street one of the 
great theatres that ran a continuous variety-show 
was discharging its surfeited crowd. How had the 
actors performed? he wondered. Had they given 
satisfaction — all the public actually craved or de- 
served? 

Turning back to his desk he gathered up his 
manuscript, arranging the sheets in order. This 
was his goblet of hemlock, perchance, and also his 
bread of life. 

In answer to the editor’s “Come in!” he opened 
the door of the sanctum and handed him the manu- 
script. “Sit down a moment, please,” and he com- 
plied whilst the editor read it, slowly, his face giv- 
ing no sign of approval — once, indeed, it took on 
a dark frown; causing Kenneth to await the verdict 
with vague uneasiness. He, perhaps, had mistaken 
his capabilities; it was not so easy to lie, after all 
— might require special genius, adaptability, a cer- 
tain ferment in the blood of which his own nature 
had nothing. 

The editor laid the manuscript on his desk, 
wearily. “It is excellent,” he said, finally, without 
looking at him. “It is worth thirty dollars a week. I 
trust that will be satisfactory. Good-night.” 

He reached the street, plunged into the crowd, 
and walked — walked like a blind man all of the way 
home to Wildwood. “Good heavens!” said 
Holden as he entered. “What has happened ?” 

He shook his head, dropped into a chair, breath- 
less. “Nothing, old man; nothing! save that I’ve 
found a job at last. Isn’t supper about ready? I’m 
hungry as a bear!” 

“A job! You don’t mean it, do you? I’m con- 
foundedly glad — you know that, Kenneth! But 
what is it?” 


DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 


323 


The answer seemed to stick in his throat. 
“L — lying, principally,” he gasped leaning forward, 
and breaking into a laugh, he added rising, ‘That 
is, I’ve joined the variety-show. Gad! how thirsty 
it makes a man — at first! Have you any water 
handy?” 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 

“But you are happier, Kenneth, more contented. 
I can tell — it makes no difference what you may 
think to the contrary.” It was a stormy night in 
the middle of March ; whilst he and Enid were driv- 
ing home from the theatre, he had spoken a mo- 
ment, inadvertently, of his present work, with 
somewhat of the old frankness and unbelief, even 
contemptuous amusement. Whence her protest; 
for with his daily work and daily pay from the Re- 
publican there had come to him almost from the 
first a peace of mind and enjoyment that delighted 
his friends quite as much as it surprised himself. 
He had known nothing like it for years, being 
able to live once more as he desired, and carrying on 
his studies and investigations free from the dictate 
of any one; had simply to keep that sublime edi- 
torial page supplied with the most superficial of 
sociologic thought, with the property of the few 
rather than the welfare of the many always upper- 
most in his mind, and that was all — a task requir- 
ing but little effort or time after once falling into 
the habit of the thing. Some day, perhaps, with 
the work he had planned, he should be able to make 
up again to society for the lies he was forced to tell 
now. Preachers, he instanced, frequently found 


3^4 


GOD'S REBEL . 


it necessary to keep on lying in the old way for 
awhile on first taking hold of a new congregation, 
until such a time as they could safely give expres- 
sion to newer and nobler truths; always making 
sure of keeping their livings first. Well, he did 
not blame them — they had to. That which the 
thoughtless called conservatism he had found, over 
and over again, to have its tap-root in the dictate 
of private capital. 

“Happier, Enid?” he repeated. “Yes, at this mo- 
ment, perhaps. Why not?” — adding that thirty 
dollars a week was a princely income for him, sup- 
plying more than enough to run his Wildwood 
home. “Holden, you see, is still doing nothing. 
I doubt if he has taken in five dollars in all the time 
he has been there. But he’ll be all right in a year 
or two. Then I shall throw up my position, and 
then ” 

He stopped; suddenly reflecting that he had been 
talking too fast. 

“And then?” she asked quietly. 

Drawing away slightly, he bent forward, glanced 
out through the pane. “How it storms!” he said 
softly. “Don’t you love to see it?” 

She shook her head. “Yes; through a glass, 
perhaps. I fancy it’s not so enjoyable out there 
on the box. Please don’t be foolish — I wish you 
would answer my question.” 

“Ah, what then?” He laughed lightly. “Why, 
then you’ll hear something drop, that’s all.” She 
was silent, knowing in sooth what he meant, as 
only a short time before he had said to her, im- 
pulsively, perceiving how rapidly opinion was grow- 
ing in favour of all that he stood for, that two-thirds 
of the people were with him — he knew it! That all 
he had to do was to reach them, and when the 
time came that he could finally call himself free 


DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 


325 


again he should write, should speak, and should 
organise. In brief, he meant to keep on fighting. 
She saw that, despite the hope that he might, some- 
how, change his mind. Other men changed theirs, 
she knew that; knew, moreover, that he believed 
in the Law of Change, nay! had even heard him 
declare it was the only law. But it was this De- 
mocracy, this growing Democracy! That, alas, 
never changed! 

The carriage drew up at her home. He opened 
the door and stepped out, retaining her hand a mo- 
ment after assisting her. “Nonsense!” as the car- 
riage turned, in, perceiving his intention ere he 
could utter the word. “You surely won’t be so 
silly as to go home in this storm? You know there 
is lots of room!” 

“But Enid, your mother isn’t ” 

She laughed. “It will keep me awake — the 
thought of it; your wading home in the slush to 
satisfy those very conventions which you affect to 
laugh at and despise. No; mamma won’t be home 
till next week. Men are very queer.” 

“Urn! I don’t see what men have to do with it,” 
he protested, as they ascended the stairs. “It’s 
women, eternally women! What did you do with 
your key? Women talk.” 

Other people talked, too, that winter; it being 
commonly rumoured that he spent more time at 
her home than was socially fair and proper. His 
Aunt Helen, even, chancing one day to miss his 
cello from its accustomed place in his own home, 
had discovered it afterwards in one corner of “that 
woman’s” music-room, laughing at her, in medi- 
aeval mockery, like some dark libidinous monk out- 
rageously poking fun at her nineteenth century 
prudery. The which she declared to be perfectly 
scandalous. “You know, Edward,” she phono- 


326 


GOD’S REBEL. 


graphed to her husband one evening whilst he sat 
intrenched behind that inexorable evening paper — 
“you know she may be a very good woman, and all 
that, besides being rich and considered handsome — 
yes, she is quite handsome; but somehow it seems 
strange, especially when Mabel is all alone away 
over in London. You saw, of course, what the 
paper had to say of her singing the other day. No? 
Let me see, I believe it was in the Republican, 
with the name of some queer London paper at the 
end. She certainly must be very successful; any- 
way I always knew she could sing. But now I 
think it is very poor taste — don’t you, Edward?” 

The which in general may be accepted as a fair 
reflection of what other people thought; and 
though they pounded the crust of their superfi- 
cialities never so hard, they elicited naught save 
the usual hollow echoes in return. 

But to Holden and Julia, at any rate, Mabel’s 
flight had come as a special dispensation of Provi- 
dence; the physician had now been in Wildwood 
nearly a year, had spent all he had, and, save for 
his friend’s assistance, should have been forced to 
give up long ago and retreat he knew not whither. 
An occasional call he had had, it is true, but solely 
among the poorer classes who could not afford to 
pay. Only a few days before Kenneth had met him 
as he was coming home. He was passing at the 
time one of those little cottages in the outskirts of 
Wildwood; the police-patrol wagon stood waiting 
there, and a number of men and women, residents 
of the neighbourhood, poorly attired, their faces 
drawn with distress, were huddled about the door- 
way. Whilst he paused, a couple of women came 
out, sobbing, their faces hid in their aprons. 

“What’s the trouble, driver?” he had queried of 
the man on the seat of the patrol-wagon. And 


DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 


327 


the answer had come, carelessly: “Oh, nothing; 
it’s Bill Harper’s wife. She’s found her husband.” 
Kenneth glanced at him sharply. Was the finding 
of a husband cause for such general distress? He 
was about to question the man further, when 
Holden came out of the house, carrying his sur- 
geon’s bag. They walked on together. “Yes,” 
said the doctor, “it’s Bill Harper’s wife now. She’s 
having fainting spells — a weak heart, occasioned by 
lack of nourishment. You see they’ve just fished 
her husband’s body out of one of the park lagoons. 
He was an engineer on the C. & N. G., but was 
boycotted after the strike at Wheeling and failed 
to find work anywhere. He was buying a home 
on this eternal monthly payment plan, but had to 
give it up and move over here. How he and his 
wife managed to subsist at all the past two months 
God only knows. He had to beg; go to the charity 
agents and ask for supplies, when he only wanted 
work. Well, it must have crazed him. Three days 
ago he told his w r ife he was going out to look for 
work, and never returned.” 

They walked on in silence, till again the doctor 
added: “I’ve been keeping the run of these suicide 
cases from economic causes lately. This one is the 
twentieth in this city so far this month — and the 
month isn’t more than half over. The.condition is 
frightful. It haunts me.” 

His friend glanced at him, with quick solicitude; 
assuring him, however, that the present condition 
could not continue. Business would be all right — 
after awhile, he had said. 

And doubtless there were ways for a doctor to 
survive even here, despite the obvious overcrowd- 
ing; ways for the smart and discreet. 

In speaking of which to Kenneth one morning 
he had asked vaguely: “Do you think me a fool? 


GOD’S REBEL. 


328 

You see to what the medical profession has de- 
scended. Am I a fool to dodge it?” 

And his friend had glanced up from his manu- 
script. “Henry,” he said reluctantly, “you know 
you would never have been guilty even of asking 
that question were it not for the money involved. 
You loathe it, and know well enough that it cannot 
be the proper function of the physician to take 
human life.” 

“Yes, yes, of course I know it. But what on 
earth can I do? I must quit the profession.” 

“What would you do then, old man — what could 
you do?” 

Knowing well Kenneth’s own dire experiences 
Holden could say nothing. 

“And yet, doctor,” Kenneth added, “there are 
excuses for these people; we know it. Society is 
its own victim; it is destroying itself, laughing and 
dancing whilst doing so. So long as the economic 
environment of a people is false, so long must in- 
dividuals resort to tricks, even to murder, to pro- 
tect themselves. It is expensive to have large fam- 
ilies, and the human race is so poor it can hardly 
live as things are. However, I shouldn’t care to be 
a doctor myself — not under such circumstances.” 

Holden came to the defensive. A man may at- 
tack his own profession, if he please, but he will 
permit no outsider to do so. “Yes, I admit it,” 
he cried, “but where is the difference, after all, be- 
tween the doctor who commits murder, as you call 
it, for a living, and within the narrow compass of 
his practice, and the man who organises a trust 
whereby to control prices and starve people to sui- 
cide and destruction. One murders his thousands, 
the other his tens of thousands — that is all.” 

Kenneth took up his pen and wrote on. He 
would not argue that whilst Holden was in his 


DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 


329 


present frame of mind. Moreover, it was too true. 
“There can be no possible choice in a business 
career to-day, Henry,” he admitted sadly. “Be a 
capitalist, a murderer, a common thug, a clergy- 
man, or a physician — it is all the same to the seeing 
eye. Whilst capital rules it can be no better. A 
man has not even the right to do right.” 

Holden passed out; he boarded a car going 
downtown, and, on arrival, deliberately went from 
store to store and office to office searching for a 
position. It were a redundancy to say he was un- 
successful; the veriest tyro in life knows that posi- 
tions to-day are not to be found in this way, and 
he himself was conscious of the absolute foolishness 
of his search; besides, he had often tried it before. 
Here and there he passed a quack medical insti- 
tute whose proprietors had thrown honesty to the 
winds and openly advertised to do the impossible in 
order to fleece the ignorant. Many of these he 
knew to be highly successful, whilst he — 

“Hello, Henry!” 

Some one laid a hand on his shoulder, and he 
turned. “Ah, how are you, Dunn. Didn’t know 
you were in town.” It was an old classmate. 

“Yes, just got back from Florida, you know. 
What are you doing, old man; practising?” 

“Yes, plugging along,” Holden answered. “And 
you?” 

“Oh, haven’t you heard? You know I picked 
up that ear-drum device when I was over in Vienna; 
and I’ve been selling ’em. Two years ago I or- 
ganised a company, we advertised it in all the lead- 
ing and most reputable magazines, and sold them 
for twenty-five dollars a pair. Of course they 
weren’t worth a damn, but the deaf will buy any old 
thing. I cleared one hundred and fifty thousand 


330 


GOD’S REBEL . 


dollars the last eighteen months. I’d quit practise 
if I were you, old chap. Nothing in it.” 

Holden gasped. Instances of this sort were be- 
coming so common to him, meeting him at every 
turn, that he was beginning to lose all confidence 
in a world of honour. Dunn had been but a poor 
student, had in fact barely passed his examinations; 
neither had he any natural ability of the kind to 
make him useful to the world. But as a creature 
to prey upon society, to get his living in accordance 
with the modern precepts of the successful, he was 
certainly not to be despised. 

“Dunn,” said he frankly, with access of despair, 
“I’ve been devilish unfortunate. I was forced to 
abandon my practice in a town where I was doing 
well, and to locate in another place. Consequently 
I’ve lost everything I ever had; and, what’s more, 
I have no practice. I don’t suppose you could loan 
me a thousand dollars, could you, till I establish 
myself somewhere?” 

Dunn’s face darkened. “What’s the matter with 
some of these rich people here in your city helping 
you, old man? Charity begins at home, you know,” 
he quoted cunningly. 

“Yes, I know; I’ve written to some of our mil- 
lionaires who make a practice of endowing insane 
asylums and eleemosynary institutions whilst cor- 
nering wheat and pork and fuel. They all begged 
to be excused; said they never loaned any money, 
even to friends.” 

“The devil! you don’t tell me? Why, I should 
think such men would feel honoured to assist a 
worthy man when they get a chance. But I’m 
sorry, Henry; every penny of my own is tied up. 
So-long; I may see you again.” 

Holden went home. “Julia, do you think your 


DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 


331 

father would loan me a thousand dollars on those 
two houses of mine in Kingston?” 

She paused in her work. “O Henry, I hate 
to ask him. Must we have it?” 

“Yes, I know how you feel. But we can’t go 
on this way much longer. This month I made 
seven dollars, last month nothing, and the month 
before I made three. I can never hope to do a 
reputable business here.” 

“But where else would you go, Henry?” she 
asked dubiously. 

“Oh, anywhere, it doesn’t matter — a small town, 
perhaps. But of course it will take money, and I 
have not been able to find a position.” 

And so, after a little hesitancy and reluctance, 
Julia agreed to write to her father. “We’ll make 
it a matter of business, dear. I’ll tell him to call 
and talk over the security with you.” 

Two days afterwards, therefore, in response to 
his daughter’s request, Mr. James Dana, pompous 
and portly and proud, with his overcoat buttoned 
close and his glossy silk hat in his hand, called to 
discuss the loan. 

“Won’t you take off your coat, papa?” said Julia. 
He had refused to kiss her. 

He glanced over the top of her head and blew 
out his cheeks. “No, I’ll only stay a moment. You 
wanted to see me, you wrote.” The physician he 
ignored altogether. 

“No, papa,” Julia began timidly, “but ” 

“Please take this chair, Mr. Dana,” said the doc- 
tor, politely, placing a rocker squarely in front of 
him. “It was I who wanted to speak with you.” 

Mr. Dana gasped, glanced down, recovered him- 
self and stepped back. 

“I’ll sit here,” said he, taking a straight-back, 


332 


GOD’S REBEL. 


wood-bottomed chair. ‘I’ve only a moment to 
lose. Please state what you wanted.” 

Julia signalled her husband to say nothing, but 
he refused to heed her. 

“I have some property in Kingston, Mr. Dana, 
that I wish to borrow some money on.” 

“Indeed, where is it?” He didn’t suppose the ras- 
cal had a penny. 

Henry described the locality. “Two houses, Mr. 
Dana,” naming their numbers. 

Mr. Dana reflected quickly. Yes, this was busi- 
ness pure and simple. “Humph! how much did 
you want?” he asked. 

Henry named the amount. 

“Nonsense, impossible! Why, they are not 
worth over five hundred apiece, and vacant at that.” 

The doctor had purchased them of Mr. Dana’s 
company. “I paid twenty-five hundred,” he said, 
clearing his throat. 

Mr. Dana started. “That was before the strike,” 
he admitted grimly. “Since then the houses have 
stood empty. Naturally, they have depreciated. 
Surely, you know that was not our fault!” 

The young scoundrel! He’d teach him to ques- 
tion his father-in-law’s honourable methods. 

“But you wouldn’t refuse to make the loan, Mr. 
Dana?” 

“Of course — at any rate for that amount.” 

“Ah, but you might loan something? How much 
would be fair, if you please?” 

Mr. Dana reflected. He didn’t want to loan a 
penny, but business was insistent. “Well, two hun- 
dred dollars; two hundred and a quarter, maybe.” 

Henry rose. “That would be of no service — no 
service whatever.” He walked the floor. “I have 
no money, no practice, and must be able to go 
somewhere else and ” 


DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 


333 


“Sir! I did not come here to hear this/’ Mr. 
Dana rose too. “I have suffered quite enough at 
your hands. You ” 

“O papa ” cried Julia, running towards him. 

He waved her aside. 

“Silence! I say you robbed me of my daughter, 
you induced my men to strike, and now try to 
badger me into loaning a thousand dollars on prop- 
erty that would barely sell for that, and when you 
can’t get it you beg of me. Well, it is useless. 
I do not feel called upon to give you any money.” 

Henry’s face flushed and grew pale again in a 
second. “No,” he answered slowly, bitterly, “I do 
not suppose you do. Money is your God; you 
obtain it, as everyone knows, by running a gigantic 
sweatshop, defying the Government and all crea- 
tion, by robbing every labourer in your employ of 
hundreds in order that you may have millions — 
well — keep it! keep it! And may it curse you on 
earth and in hell!” 

Julia caught his arm. “O Henry! don’t! Do 

take it back — you don’t mean it! O papa ” 

She was crying. 

Her father had started for the door, turned, and 
glanced back at her. “Julia,” said he, “it’s no more 
than I expected when you ran off with him. You 
can’t expect that kind of a man to be a gentleman.” 
He passed out, heavily. 

“O Henry — Henry!” she sobbed. “Why did you 
say that — how could you? But — but you — didn’t 
mean it. No, dear; no! Oh, do go and tell — go 
after him! He will never forgive us — never!” 

She was kneeling before him — hands clasped at 
his knee. Strangely, scarce conscious of his act, 
he freed himself, laid her worn little hands on the 
arm of the chair by his side; she buried her head, 
and he stood there a moment — at bay! All the 


334 


GOD’S REBEL . 


world was against him, condemned him — his wife, 
with the rest. How strange he felt! the world was 
slipping under his feet. Silently, dizzily, he stole 
out into the hall, felt his way to his office, and the 
next moment a shot rang out; Julia screamed, and 
fell to the floor. 

Meanwhile Mr. Dana had gone on, setting him- 
self a brisk pace of several blocks until he broke 
out into perspiration and his fever had chance to 
cool. Then he walked slower ; being of a full-blood- 
ed, irascible, emphysematous habit, he puffed, and 
blew out his cheeks. It was very reckless in him to 
walk so fast, he bethought himself; he was past 
middle age and could feel that it affected his heart. 
It thumped! thumped! thumped! and his ears 
buzzed queerly. Wh — what if he should die? He 
had heard of such things — there was nothing im- 
probable in fearing it. And again he reduced his 
pace. At last he was in the business center of 
Wildwood, standing in front of the local bank whilst 
waiting for his car. He glanced in through the 
plate glass; it was nearing closing-time, and the 
teller had his gold stacked up convenient for count- 
ing and locking up for the night. Mr. Dana looked 
at him, and sighed. What a fool he had been to 
get so excited over a little money — aye, worse than 
a fool! He stepped inside, asked if they knew his 
signature, and receiving a smiling affirmative he 
drew his check for four figures and came out with 
his pocket bulging over the breast. 

Ah me! How infinitely better men are than the 
business they represent! 

He repaced his way; his heart thumped louder 
than ever. He tried to walk slower, but couldn’t. 
I’ll show them, said he, a smile tugging at the 
corners of his mouth, that I can be generous — that 
I am older than they are, and know more. Why, 


DOUBTFUL SECURITY. 


335 

they are only children! But they shouldn’t have 
mentioned business — it always excites me, makes 
me shut my teeth tight. Yes, business is ruthless, 
ruthless; but we have to be so — we must draw the 
girth tight or the saddle will slip. His pace quick- 
ened; and his heart — would it never stop thump- 
ing? 

At last he reached the street where Julia lived, 
turned the corner at a generous clip, his hand on 
the fence-post, and came on with a laugh. It was 
good to see him. Midway up the block a num- 
ber of carriages were waiting and circling, and at 
their door a group of people stood talking. His 
face changed; he broke into a run. “My God! what 
is it?” he cried, shouldering his way in at the door. 

From the hall he glanced in at the office. His 
heart stood still, and his knees trembled. Thence 
he groped his way on into the room where he had 
spoken with that — that man, less than an hour ago. 

The door opened. “Julia, O Julia,” he cried, 
going towards her. 

She had been sitting on the sofa, some woman 
supporting her; at sight of him she screamed and 
lost consciousness. 

He never knew how he got to the door. Some 
one must have led him out. The open air revived 
him and he found his way to a carriage. Complete- 
ly dazed, he rolled on to his home. When he 
alighted at his curb he threw open his coat, thrust- 
ing the package that lay like an icy hand over his 
heart into the hands of the astonished driver. 

“Keep it! Keep it!” he screamed, then cowered 
at the words as an echo that haunted from hell. 
That package he would not have touched again for 
the sum of his fortune. 

Again, a few days later, he called on his daugh- 
ter, but was refused admittance, She was quite ill. 


GOD’S REBEL. 


33 ^ 

Then later he wrote her: “Come home, come 
home!” 

And the answer caught him tottering; sent his 
soul a-shuddering outwards into the vastness that 
lay around him, that engulfed him as a grain of 
sand upon the rising tide of humanity which he had 
been so blind, so foolish, as to try to beat back with 
the palm of his hand. He was drowning in it, 
drowning; there was none to hear his voice nor see 
his struggles save the myriad gods and imps who 
danced before his eyes and laughed at him. “A 
speck on a pin-head,” they called him; an atom so 
tiny in the plan of all creation that he lost con- 
sciousness in trying to see himself as utterly small 
as he really was. And at night they crept into his 
room, searched his pockets, took his gold coin, and 
sat cross-legged there on his pillow playing a 
monotonous tune in his ears: “Clink! clink! clink! 
O speck on a pin-head, clink!” And when he 
opened his eyes in the first dim light of the day 
there was Julia’s letter always before him — always: 

“Never speak nor write to me again. Let me 
try to forget that I ever had a father who was my 
husband’s murderer!” 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 

“James,” said Mrs. Dana, as her husband sat 
down to breakfast one morning, after one of those 
battle-fought nights revealed unwillingly to all the 
world, even to her, by those indelible dreams which 
he vainly sought to efface — “James, have you no- 
ticed any account of this bank failure?” 

She seemed very serious. Glancing up at her 


THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 


337 


quickly, he perceived that she was reading that 
treacherous newspaper which only the day before 
he had ordered stopped; it had changed owners re- 
cently without his knowledge, and directly had be- 
gun talking about him and his affairs with discour- 
tesy, libelling him outrageously merely because he 
had always insisted on running his own business in 
a manner to suit himself. Clearly it had become 
the craze to attack him; among all he knew there 
was none now save his wife who stood by him; 
she alone remained true, heedless how others ma- 
ligned him. And his heart had gone out to her for 
it, become strangely softened at sight of it even 
though at times she reminded him painfully of Julia. 
Aye, she was just Julia’s age when he married her; 
and again he saw her, for an instant, sitting op- 
posite to him at breakfast as on that morning after 
their wedding. How proud he had been of her! 
He still recalled how society had welcomed her, 
patting him on the back the while — even though he 
was the son of his father — and exclaiming: “Ah, 
lucky fellow !” And she was rich, too; Mary Marsden 
was of an eastern family that had been honourably 
rich for two generations. It was her money that had 
laid the foundation of his own present fortune. 
Still gazing at her, he wondered why it was that 
in all this time she really had changed so little; 
yes, she had been always the same, bearing with 
him; generous, loving and loyal — a period covering 
more than thirty years; thirty years — since he had 
married and forgotten her. Ah, perhaps he him- 
self had changed — a little, though he trusted not, 
vaguely. 

“No,” he replied uneasily. “I have not seen it. 
Anyway, you can’t rely on that paper, Mary. I 
shouldn’t read it.” He sipped his coffee, uncom- 
fortably. 

22 


338 


GO US REBEL . 


She dropped the paper wearily, and leaned back. 
“What is it?” he asked. “Aren’t you well? Are 
you losing your appetite?” He had feared, though 
she gave no sign of it, that Julia’s misfortunes 
might weigh more heavily on her than she had 
ever confessed. “I wish you would consent to see 
some one, Mary,” he persisted; “some doctor who 
really understands you.” 

She shook her head, sadly. “No, James, there is 
no one — who understands — so well as myself.” 

He started visibly, was on the point of asking 
her squarely what on earth she pretended to mean. 
But recovered himself, thought better of it; and 
answered playfully with affected relief — 

“Why, then, so much the better. We shall know 
exactly what to do, and save our money whilst 
doing it. So then, what is it, Doctor Mary?” 

“No, I don’t care for the money — to save it, you 
know that, James,” she began, with strange ir- 
relevancy, he thought. “But I do know the rem- 
edy. And if I could only make you see it, believe 
in it, so that you would not mind the cost, either — 
nay, even be glad of it — then, I think we should be 
sure of the cure. Oh yes, I know we should, 
dear.” 

He moved restlessly in his chair. “If you would 
be more explicit,” he said, subjoining with manifest 
irritation, “Pray, state what you mean, Mary. Cure 
for what?” 

r ~ “For the wrong,” she moaned quickly, impul- 
sively; “and oh! for the ache, and the weariness. 
For the starved faces that look up at us, every- 
where, when we pass; that follow us into our homes 
and sit down with us, looking at us still, now, whilst 
we eat.” She caught her breath, and went on. 
“Why, didn’t you hear those two men only last 
night when I drove out to the works for you? They 
were standing close by the carriage when you 


THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 


339 


stepped in. The window was down at my side, 
and I heard one of them say: ‘See! that is James 
Dana. Wouldn’t you like a slice of what he’s got?’ 
And the other one answered, so bitterly that I 
hear his words yet: ‘No, thank you; it’s blood 
money, blood money! His very carriage is red with 
it. I should choke eating food at his table, even 
with blood to wash it down!’ Then he laughed. 
Oh, James, it is frightful! frightful!” 

“Faugh!” Her husband waved his hand, madly, 
as if brushing aside the too insistent insect buzz- 
ing before him. “No, I didn’t hear them. It 
would have made no difference anyway. Are we to 
notice the envious slurs of every lazy good-for- 
nothing fool in this town? Nonsense! You are 
simply upset a little, Mary. We shall go away for 
a time, then you will come back and laugh at it. 
Surely you give enough to charity, don’t you? 
What more can they want, these tramps! You 
know very well there must always be poor people 
and rich people.” 

The French clock on the mantel ticked musically, 
monotonously, back and forth, back and forth, 
“Rich people and poor people,” it repeated; and 
again, and again: “Rich, poor; rich, poor.” It had 
always ticked so. 

His wife made no reply. It annoyed him. Every- 
thing seemed to mock him, somehow, even the 
ticking of the clock. Why couldn’t she speak to 
him! Anything was preferable to this uncomfort- 
able silence between them — between them! when 
deep in his heart he knew it had long been either 
silence or lies between him and the rest of the 
world. “What did you mean, Mary,” he stam- 
mered, “by saying, you know, that you knew a 
remedy for this nonsense in case I didn’t care for 
the money. For you know I don’t care — particu- 


340 


GOD’S REBEL. 


larly; that is, it is yours as much as mine; and 
Julia’s, too, with the child she expects — if ever she 
comes to her senses! Tell me, what did you mean?” 

Gliding quickly round the table, she leaned over 
his shoulder girlishly, and kissed him, knelt on a 
hassock by his side. “Do you mean it?” she cried. 
“Oh, James, are you really in earnest?” 

Her eagerness pleased him. How much she was 
to him, after all! His curiosity was aflame again. 
“How do I know,” he asked, “till I hear what you 
want?” 

She smiled; the light shone in her eyes. That 
was the way he used to speak at such moments — 
moments when he had never refused her. “No, 
it is not a new coach, pair of horses, necklace or 
carpets. Don’t be foolish — you know that is all 
past. Neither is it a new bed in some hospital, 
gift to a church, an orphanage, or some school.” 

“Go on,” he said, his brows knitting as she 
paused. 

“Well, it is this. Don’t say you can’t do it, for 
you can — you should! I want you to give every 
workman out at Wheeling who has been there 
three years ” 

“Yes?” he challenged her nervously. 

“His own home,” she demanded. “If you 
haven’t enough to go round, then build more. It 
won’t cost very much. I have money, you know 
— you may use it all. Then pay them enough to 
live and save something.” 

For answer he pushed his chair aside, rising 
abruptly, and beginning to pace the floor. “Yes, 
I might have known,” he coughed, as though re- 
peating the answer already revolved in his mind. 
“It is that fellow again, that Dr. Holden ! He made 
Julia believe in his theories — and now she repeats 
them to you. Well, I tell you he was crazy, crazy! 


THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 


34t 


I always thought so, and his going the way he did 
proves it. Yet his theories, you see, still live to 
prick and annoy me long after he is dead! You 
know it, Mary. You should have known better 
than to take any stock in such nonsense! You 
know it is offensive — to any man of intelligence. I 
tell you that kind of a man should be hanged off- 
hand. His theories will upset every institution in 
this country if they ever gain ground/' 

Her face again took on the wearied expression as 
at first. Glancing up at the angry man who glared 
down at her, she asked quietly: “Are our institu- 
tions so perfect then, James, that it would be un- 
holy to upset them, as you say?” 

“Faugh! There you go again, Mary! Holy or 
not, our institutions are not founded on theory, but 
fact — as men have chosen to make them. And I 
say it is unwise and impossible to change things!” 
He moved away, stood looking out of the window 
a moment where the sparrows twittered and the 
sun shone without warmth upon the bare frozen 
earth. He saw nothing, however. 

“Listen, James!” she protested gently. “You 
have misunderstood me. I know nothing what- 
ever of these theories you dislike. Julia has never 
said a word to me, and as for her husband, poor 
fellow! we shall gain nothing by blaming him 
further. But I do know this, James: those men 
down at Wheeling have never been paid as they 
should be. Why, look at them; they are all pau- 
pers still, living from hand to mouth, whilst we 
and others, who have worked little if at all, have 
grown rich. Do you think this is right? Or even 
if it is right, within the law, would you have the 
heart, meeting a poor man on the street, to hold 
him up day after day and take away nearly all of 
his earnings simply because you are the stronger?” 


342 


GOD'S REBEL . 


Mr. Dana turned round. “How long has it been, 
Mary,” he asked hardly, “since the Marsdens began 
to give back a portion of their plunder?” 

“The Marsdens!” she cried in astonishment. 
“What do you mean, James? You know very well 
that the Marsdens made their money honestly, in 
banking, never plundered a soul; never engaged in 
any of these lawless corporations that nowadays 
move heaven and earth to get rich. No, I don’t 
blame anyone — don’t misunderstand me; but my 
people made their money at a time when such 
schemes would have been considered dishonour- 
able. When a man would rather have died than 
rob the poor, take advantage of the helpless. Oh, 
James, let us stop it, let us give it all up, keeping 
only the little I had. It is enough; the rest — is 
blood money.” 

Ignoring her appeal, he replied, with less passion: 
“Yes, I see, but this only goes to prove your ig- 
norance of the whole question. I am sorry to — to 
make you feel that your people’s money is no more 
honourable, as you call it, than our own; but it is 
only common fairness to me, to ourselves, to speak 
plainly. Mary, did you never realise that banking, 
honourable banking, is about the most heartless 
and hypocritical business in all this Christian world? 
Why, you accuse us nowadays of taking advan- 
tage of the helpless and unfortunate. Did you 
never think a moment that this very class is always 
the banker’s victim? Since time began, the help- 
less and unfortunate have been the legitimate prey 
of the banker. How, then, am I any different from 
your people, who made their money on mortgage, 
interest, and foreclosure — by the loaning of money? 
A business that Christ himself condemned — oh yes, 
everybody knows that; and that the church has 
never sanctioned save as it had to.” 


THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 


343 


Silence. The clock ticked on, approvingly at 
present; seemed now to lend him strength. “Why,” 
she asked finally, “did you never tell me this? J 
have told you that I know nothing of such things. 
Why should you mock me with my helplessness 
now?” 

“No — my God! I did not mean to mock you, 
Mary; look up! I beg your pardon a thousand 
times. But you forced me to — to defend myself. 
These are things, of course, that men do not speak 
of. People think we do not know; but it’s a 
mistake, we do know; but we are powerless to 
help ourselves; must all do the best we can. Well, 
I have simply taken advantage of my opportunities, 
Mary, at Wheeling as elsewhere. The same as your 
own people did in the past, as everyone does to-day 
— and will go on doing.” 

She arose, stood beside him. A moment he held 
both her hands in his unresistingly, till again her 
eyes fell on the paper she had been reading. “Go 
on doing,” she echoed tremulously, his last words 
sweeping her on as a leaf in the storm — “go on 
doing, even when it means murder?” 

“Mary!” 

His voice rang out, pierced her with its quick 
vibrations implying challenge and entreaty, as he 
dropped her hands. Was she to accuse him of that 
fellow's death, heap it upon him even as the rest 
of the world? Her face paled; but no, she shook 
her head; as if divining his thought, she an- 
swered — 

“No, James, not that, but listen! You remem- 
ber — I asked you when you entered if you had 
heard of this bank’s failure.” 

“Yes, and I said no. However, I presume it is 
the Chicaqua National. It is no news to me — I ex- 
pected it yesterday.” 


344 


GOD'S REBEL . 


“And the president — did you expect that, too? 
He has committed suicide.’ , 

He staggered. “Impossible !” and then, rallying 
quickly: “Why, he would never be guilty of such a 
foolish thing! Let me see it!” 

She handed him the paper. He read the head- 
lines, and sat down heavily in his chair, his arms 
on the table. 

“I shan’t ask you, James, if it is true,” she said 
slowly, pitifully. “Perhaps it is nothing, anyway, 
save what we have always done in the past, as 
everyone does to-day — and will go on doing. You 
see the paper says that bank held a majority of 
the stock of a certain street-car company, which 
was a rival to another company of which you are 
president. That in order to break up the rival com- 
pany and acquire its stock below par, a scheme 
was entered into to wreck this bank. The plans 
were successful; and the president, ruined, drowns 
himself in the lake. Is it not plain enough, James, 
even to us; and if to us, how much more so to 
the people at large? How must they regard us — 
with all this blood — this blood — mon ” 

“Stop!” raising his hand passionately. “I sha’n’t 
hear it. Not another word, Mary — not a word! 
I tell you you can’t understand these things as a 
man. I’ve told you already that business has noth- 
ing to do with theory. Well, then, let that be 
enough!” 

“But has it nothing to do with honour, either? 
No, no! you will promise to do what I asked, won’t 
you, James?” she persisted undauntedly. “I mean 
about those houses, and paying more wages.” 

“Why, no! No; I can promise no such thing. 
I don’t own the works, do I? Besides we shall have 
all we can do to pay our dividends as it is. If we 
should increase wages it would ruin us. I wish you 


THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 


345 

wouldn’t concern yourself with what you can’t un- 
derstand!” 

“But I must understand it,” she cried, her voice 
rising. “It is my duty. If this money ruins inno- 
cent families, makes widows, and works desolation 
among my own friends and neighbours, if it is truly 
blood money, as people say ” 

“Mary, don’t repeat that word again!” 

“Very well; but answer me this, please,” she 
went on, with decision. “If the Wheeling works 
made enough money last year to pay dividends 
amounting to forty per cent, why can’t they in- 
crease wages?” 

“Because,” he cried, stung by her pertinacity into 
declaring the actual state of affairs, thoughtless of 
consequences — “because we have issued more 
stock; two shares for one — do you hear? Well, 
this has been sold, most of it, to new purchasers — 
to widows and orphans, some of it; and in good 
faith we are in duty bound to pay a fair rate of in- 
terest — must do so to keep up our standing. Can 
you understand that? The same reason, you see, 
that the Marsdens encountered whenever they 
loaned money. It wasn’t right for them to fore- 
close farm mortgages, was it, just because people 
couldn’t keep up the interest? How did they know 
whether crops would be good or bad? God alone 
could know that!” 

“Two shares for one,” she gasped with wide eyes, 
paying no heed to his taunt. “Is that what you 
said?” 

“Yes, yes, of course. It’s the way — the world 
over.” 

“And you must pay dividends on this — this sec- 
ond stock, the same as the first?” 

He made no answer, had acknowledged that al- 
ready. The Wheeling company could not afford 


346 


GOB’S REBEL . 


to anticipate or speculate on dull times any more 
than the Marsdens, her people, had ever consid- 
ered drought and the failure of crops. Great finan- 
ciers always left that part of the problem to God. 
He wished she would understand that! 

She moved away, stood thinking a moment with 
clasped hands, her back towards him; turning 
finally, and resting a hand on his shoulder, she 
said: “Listen, why should we seek to deceive our- 
selves in this matter? Surely it requires no intelli- 
gence to understand what that means — that sec- 
ond issuing of stock. Why, James, it’s a swindle !” 

He started violently, shook her hand aside 
roughly; was on the point of making a sharp re- 
joinder, but she kept right on, gave him no time. 
“No, no, let us at least be honest here, between our- 
selves. There can be nothing secret in this — all 
the world knows it; all the world must know that if 
anything happens now, if dull times come or prices 
fall, that the Wheeling company will be unable to 
pay dividends on all that stock without reducing 
wages and starving their workmen. All the world,” 
despairingly, “can see that we have given hostages 
to the devil — signed a bond with Nemesis; why, 
then, should we be blind to it ourselves? Wait!” 
she went on rapidly, her voice gathering force with 
the pent intensity of long repression, the hurrying 
flood adown the gulf that had been growing be- 
tween them, widening silently when he thought 
they were nearest, without his perception till now — 
till now, when she stood on the ledge opposite and 
called out to him, her voice sounding far and 
strange, without passion, without respect, almost 
he thought without love — “Wait! you know I 
have tried to stop you before, but you would never 
listen. I could never make it seem real, some- 
how, this doubling of all our money every year 


THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 


34 7 


whilst the workmen complained, starved, went out 
on strike. Well, I can stand it no longer, James; 
it is killing me. How am I to look that banker’s 
wife in the face, and her fatherless children? You 
know they are intimate friends — attend the same 
church. And Julia — if what I say means nothing 
to you, now, after all these years, I shall go to her. 
She needs me, perhaps ” 

“Mary!” At last he had cried out, in sheer as- 
toundment, though too unnerved to add a sylla- 
ble more in protest. 

Yet again, at the sound of her name, she had 
come back to him, knelt by his side. “Ah, then 
you will promise me, James?” she pleaded passion- 
ately. “You will have nothing more to do with 
such wicked schemes; will give up everything — 
for my sake?” 

The softening of her tone, and her manner, syvept 
aside the barriers, the hallucinations, that had risen, 
and an instant he glanced at her, wildly, yet grate- 
fully. How foolish he had been! He had fallen 
asleep and been dreaming. See! Was she not 
speaking to him as a wife should speak to her 
husband? Still, some insistent question still trem- 
bled on her lips; ah, he remembered it now — 
had even heard it before. And with an effort he 
rallied. 

“Give it up! What — what up?” he asked, rising 
slowly and standing unsteadily as he touched a 
bell-button. The butler entered. “Order the car- 
riage at once,” he commanded; and the man bowed 
and withdrew. “You mean give up all this — this 
blood you’ve been talking about? Why, Mary, I 
tell you it’s all foolishness. I don’t see any — any 
blood.” He affected to smile at her. “I must be 
off to the office.” 


348 


GOD’S REBEL. 


“What! You will drive — through the streets — 
to-day?” 

“Yes, madam,” he cried irascibly, “I shall! I 
shall! No one will mob me, I suppose.” 

But he would take chances no further; feeling 
his way out of the room, blindly, and into the 
hall, he drew on his overshoes, and was adjusting 
his muffler when his wife followed, took his over- 
coat off the rack and held it for him. Neither 
spoke for a moment, and when at last she ad- 
dressed him her tones seemed fraught merely with 
dull resignation. 

“You know that you are already carrying too 
much on your shoulders, James ” 

“Oh no, nonsense! It is nothing but play to 
me.” 

“But you don’t sleep, get the rest that you ” 

“Who — I?” He drew out his handkerchief, 
mopped his forehead. “No, of course I don’t sleep 
as I used to — no man does. One hasn’t time. But 
I didn’t suppose you knew that, Mary.” 

“Yes,” she replied, but without looking at him, 
“I hear you, sometimes, speaking out in the 
night.” 

“In the night! No, no,” he protested quickly; 
“it’s a mistake. I never speak out like that! 
Have I turned foolish? No; you dream it, Mary; 
it’s the boys on the street.” He felt his hands 
growing moist, passed his handkerchief from one 
palm to the other. Why did she go on worrying 
herself over him, inevitably reminding him of what 
no one could help — not now. “Mary, you only 
annoy me by this — by this ” 

He got no further. Her every expression fore- 
told her answer, cut him short. Her first words, as 
he dropped into a chair, he scarcely heard at all 
save as a confused murmur, ringing a thousand 


THE BOND OF NEMESIS. 


349 


tinkling echoes afar off, then anon sounding nearer 
and nearer, breaking into a roar. Again the flood 
was between them; he saw her dimly through the 
reddening mist, hearing her voice at intervals. “It 
is useless to urge! I have kept on hoping day after 
day that you would finally confess the evil — for 
it must be evil, this thing that devours the inno- 
cent in its pitiless toils whilst men plot.” A pause, 
and she continued. “No, it is not as though we 
had to do these things; we could stop, if we chose” 
— her words lingering after, repeating themselves, 
enveloping him, yet withal was he powerless to in- 
terpret them, to make protest till the moment had 
passed. At the words, “I had hoped before this 
that you would do something, James, that would 
make it possible for Julia to come back to us, her 
heart changed towards you,” he had intended to 
reply; had in fact opened his mouth but couldn’t 
speak; could only sit and stare at her stupidly, im- 
potently, though he had really meant to say some- 
thing there — to say something; and the failure to 
do so kept echoing foolishly in his brain. Inso- 
much that her final words as she half turned away, 
one foot on the stairs, found him spent and panting, 
plagued still with that clinging palsy of dream-life, 
that one thing which he could not crush; creeping 
serpent-like out of himself whilst his real self slept. 

“It would simply be sanctioning what my heart 
loathes,” her swift glance stripping the rooms bare 
as she looked back, — “my staying here in the midst 
of all this — purchased at the price of guilt. No, I 
shall not be very far, at any time. You have but 
to come to me — when you need me. I shall only 
take what I brought you, and try to use it, with 
Julia’s help, to wipe out some of the stain of this — 
this increase.” 

She passed on up the stairs, leaving him staring 


350 


GOD’S REBEL . 


confusedly after her, making no move, speaking no 
word. Try as he would he could not call her back 
to him; her very name, it seemed, in his madness 
to speak it, held his lips tightly sealed. Fool! 
Why had he not spoken whilst yet God permitted 
him? For what was all this — this increase, as she 
named it, compared to her, to his family? No, no! 
she misjudged him extravagantly; he was not as 
she thought him; was never in fact either more or 
less than other men in the midst of this world. 
Why should she blame him so pitilessly, then, for 
exercising only his common rights — under the 
law! Who save women and children, and the wick- 
edly envious, looking on the ultimate star of his 
success, should see it turning red in the heavens 
— come to speak of it so? He could not tell it 
would lead to murder, could he? And with her 
vanishing footsteps the silence stole over him; al- 
ready his home was under its pall — as in the night. 
And again his hallucinations trooped forth, those 
scarlet revellers of sound and perception, disturbed 
only for a moment by the crunching wheels of his 
carriage driving round to the door. The sunlight 
slanted through the coloured glass in the hall, and 
the carpet at his feet became suddenly crimsoned. 
Fie attempted to move his feet out of it; was grow- 
ing moist all over. The swollen veins stood out 
on his chubby white hands where tiny beads of 
water that had sparkled at first with his diamonds 
now changed in a flash to red — blood red. 

“Mr. Dana,” he heard the butler call out, as he 
entered the room and stood bowing blandly be- 
fore him — “Mr. Dana, your carriage is bloody.” 

He started forward, fell rather than stood on his 
feet. “It’s a lie, you scoundrel!” he cried, with 
supreme effort. “It’s a lie!” 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 


351 

The servant gasped; his master swayed and fell 
at his feet. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

THE GODS SEND WAR. 

“Professor Moore,” said the managing-editor of 
the Republican , as Kenneth entered the sanctum 
early one afternoon, “I presume you have observed 
this constantly growing and widespread belief on 
the part of the general public, that it is becoming 
more and more impossible for any man to succeed 
or live at all in this world, and be honest — in ac- 
cordance with the precepts of Christ?” 

Kenneth sighed and sat down. “Yes, sir; I have 
been aware of — of that impression,” he conceded. 

The editor smiled. “Ah, I thought so,” picking 
up a manuscript from his desk. “For this reason 
I wish you would reply to this fellow. You will 
catch his argument at once, of course; to wit, that 
our economic institutions of to-day are all founded 
on force and fraud, that profit and interest are 
simply legalised robbery, hence it is impossible for 
any man to be honest. Now I wish you would try 
and utterly smash that idea. Tell him, you know, 
that the world would be very well as it is if people 
would only change their hearts. That is what 
preachers say, I believe. Well, a newspaper doesn’t 
need to go beyond the church in its efforts to guide 
and instruct the public. Do you understand?” 

Kenneth did not reply at once. Indeed he had 
entered the office feeling thoroughly out of sorts 
with himself and his work; with the old, despairing 
habit of truth-telling strong upon him. In such a 
moo'd he felt it quite beyond his power to lie sue- 


352 


GOD’S REBEL . 


cessfully, upon the gad, so as properly to impress 
the general public. “I beg your pardon/’ he an- 
swered slowly, “but I can scarcely reply to that ar- 
gument. You know, and I know, that the public 
can’t change their hearts, can’t be honest, even if 
they wish — unless they choose to starve.” And 
then, recklessly: “Why, look at me! Am I hon- 
est? Could I continue to get a living here if I 
ceased to lie, or changed my heart? I can’t change 
my heart till the whole world changes its heart!” 

The editor shook his head, patiently. “My dear 
fellow, I wish you wouldn’t speak of that. You 
know it is useless for us to rebel. You have your- 
self to support, and I my family. I am speaking 
to you simply as the editor of this newspaper. 
Neither your feelings nor my own have anything 
to do with the question.” 

Kenneth rose, and again he begged his pardon. 
“Yes, I know, and I don’t blame you or anyone 
else. Only I am so sick of it — sick to the very soul! 
I can’t write that sort of stuff any more. Will you 
accept my resignation?” 

The editor gasped; staring at him a moment, 
he answered: “Of course — if you wish it. But I 
beg you to do nothing hastily. You are not feel- 
ing well, perhaps. I advise you to take a day off. 
Go out and look around, and if you find such a 
thing as an honest man anywhere, a man who is 
neither being robbed nor robbing others, come 
back and tell me about him. Then it will be 
time enough for us to talk about being honest our- 
selves. Prosperity hasn’t agreed with you, evi- 
dently. You have forgotten how you felt that day 
you called here and wanted work, last November.” 

“No, no, I haven’t forgotten it/’ Kenneth pro- 
tested quickly. “In fact I shall never forget it, 
nor your kindness and forbearance. But I simply 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 


353 

cannot go on with this — this daily sacrifice of con- 
science.” 

In the half-year of their acquaintance their 
friendship and understanding had become mutual; 
hence it was that, knowing himself to be strictly 
within the limits of that friendship, the editor ex- 
claimed, in good-natured contempt — 

“Conscience! My dear fellow, you know very 
well that conscience has no rating in Bradstreet’s. 
Have you no other resource? If not I shall refuse 
to accept your resignation.” 

Kenneth smiled. Yes, he had something perhaps 
besides his conscience that he could fall back on. 
He had managed to save up one hundred dollars; 
then there was his novel, on which he had been at 
work all winter. It would be ready in a couple of 
weeks. That would probably tide him over for 
awhile. 

“You never told me what subject you were writ- 
ing on. I hope, for your sake, that it doesn’t deal 
with what you sociologists call ‘the economic trag- 
edy.’ People won’t read it, you know.” 

He explained. Yes, the book did turn on eco- 
nomics, being a tale of Caius Gracchus and the at- 
tempt to revive the Licinian land laws some twenty- 
one hundred years ago. When he had closed the 
editor said: “Well, I honestly trust it may make a 
hit. Still, the rich will shy at it, you know — at that 
division of the land, even if it all happened over two 
thousand years ago. They will say it is suggestive. 
I hope you added something obscene, a Roman 
banquet or religious orgie, just to make it interest- 
ing to our leisure class. However, bring me a copy 
when it is out, and I promise to see that our book- 
reviewer doesn’t damn it more than is absolutely 
necessary to protect the Republican’ s policy.” 

Thus he had brought his newspaper career to a 

23 


354 


GOD'S REBEL. 


close; a step which he had contemplated since 
Holden’s death some two months ago, and especially 
after Julia’s return home. No longer did there seem 
the faintest necessity for his continuing to mislead 
and deceive the general public, and all for a paltry 
thirty dollars a week. The stimulus that had im- 
pelled him at first urged him no more. Indeed, save 
for the solicitations of his friends, he would have 
thrown up his position in the first despairing shock 
and grief that well-nigh overwhelmed him at the 
passionate passing of his friend. Why had not 
Holden spoken to him, instead of to that miserly, 
old thief, his father-in-law? Afterwards, though, he 
had heard the story of Janies Dana’s going to the 
bank and drawing out a thousand dollars — and 
giving it to the hackman who had driven him home! 
And in the bitter loneliness of his heart he had 
laughed at this wicked comedy of greed and ill- 
starred benevolence; had written it up, savagely, 
and in the excitement of the hour had even suc- 
ceeded in having it published in a newspaper where- 
in Mr. Dana was the chief stockholder. 

But at first mention of his intent to throw up 
his newspaper work he was met with objections, 
strenuous and unanswerable, with logic that caused 
him to stagger. “Why!” he had exclaimed, in 
righteous indignity at their unreasonable interfer- 
ence, “you don’t know what you are counselling. 
Would you be so utterly reckless of all law and 
morality as to tell a thief to keep on stealing, or 
otherwise supplying his wants dishonestly, when he 
really desires to reform?” Whereto they had an- 
swered severally: “Yes, of course; at least till the 
thief finds some visible way of honestly supplying 
those wants. You would advise him so too, pro- 
fessor, were the thief any one else than yourself.” 

Perforce he acceded, but with the resolve then 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 


355 


and there to find some honest business as quickly 
as possible, even should it pay but a pittance. And 
a few evenings thereafter Enid had urged him to 
try his hand at a story. “It may be the means of 
escape, you know, from the business-world which 
you so dislike. ,, The suggestion had been in- 
stantly seconded by Nannette, with promise of her 
assistance. “I am sure you will find it interesting,” 
she had insisted, “and it will take your mind in 
other directions for a time.” But at this he had 
demurred; refused to consider any plot or tale 
that had no special significancy, declaring that he 
had neither power nor inclination to write those 
suave, fluent words of no particular import such 
as the superficial world without might hail as liter- 
ature. 

At this point Kent had entered, and being ap- 
pealed to he had at once suggested an historical 
novel based on the economic rebellion of earlier 
days. “Why don’t you try Caius Gracchus?” he 
asked. “I believe that period would just suit you. 
Those people are all buried now, and you are priv- 
ileged to speak of the wealthy class of that day with 
all the contempt they deserve. The O. G. Gold- 
smith-Smith Co. would be glad to publish such a 
novel, I feel sure.” 

“You are so fortunate, professor,” said Nannette 
wickedly, “in not being famous. If you were, 
the O. G. Goldsmith-Smith Publishing Company 
wouldn’t even look at your book, and you would 
be obliged to go to a better house.” 

Kenneth glanced at her in surprise. “If I were 
famous — what do you mean?” 

“Oh, I mean it is one of his ridiculous notions,” 
she declared; “you see he considers it hopeless for 
famous authors ever to learn anything. Now do 
be honest, Mr. Kent.” 


GOD'S REBEL . 


356 

“Well then, I do think so,” Kent admitted franx- 
ly; “inasmuch as so few authors have any mod- 
esty •” 

“Oh dear! to whom does he refer, professor?” 

“Inasmuch as few authors have any adequate 
conception of modesty,” Sam continued, ruthlessly, 
“their very first success is bound to unfit them for 
any further usefulness in this world. Why, just 
glance a moment at the popular young author! 
The instant he meets with success he ceases to live 
in a way that might insure his continued good 
work, but straightway proceeds to buy a brick 
house, to keep a wife, an angora cat, a cow and a 
nursery, furniture, horses and servants. Thus en- 
cumbered how shall he hope to achieve greatness? 
When trifles come trooping in at the door in this 
manner his pristine aspiration burns itself out with 
the smoke from his family hearth. No longer does 
he give reflection to that life which he has learned 
by virtue of long years of struggling and hard 
knocks, but betakes himself anon to the depiction of 
titles roues, sentimental heiresses and the thousand 
and one conventional trivialities that make our fic- 
tion a dead weight scarcely to be borne with pa- 
tience. And all because of this unfortunate suc- 
cess, which makes him eternally forgetful of the 
more interesting life whence he sprang.” 

Kenneth sighed. “Perhaps you are right,” he 
conceded, “yet I confess that I should like to ex- 
perience the phenomenon of a financial success. 
I believe that I should have modesty enough to 
withstand its snares.” 

“Oh, they all believe that,” Sam went on. “Why, 
I have in mind several very promising writers 
whose names I could mention” — here he looked 
at Nannette, who flushed furious, and her eyes 
snapped, whilst he smiled and continued. “They all 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 


35 7 


thought themselves able to withstand it, but none 
of them have ever done anything since, because 
they are for the present completely out of touch 
with humanity.” 

“But their books continue to sell,” urged Enid, 
only half convinced. 

“Unfortunately they do, but for the same reason 
that the public continues to pay its hard-earned 
money to see plays like East Lynne and The Lady 
of Lyons. Oh, I confess it seems hopeless to me 
sometimes, hopeless for any author of real nobility 
to expect any recognition in the sight of a public 
that is for the greater part stone blind.” 

“Oh” — “But” — “You are too sweeping!” Fem- 
inine voices vied in condemning. “At least, other 
books are entertaining.” 

Sam sighed. “Possibly, possibly. Yet it is ex- 
ceedingly doubtful whether it should be esteemed 
more respectable or commendable to take literary 
opium than that of the common drug stores. All 
forms of dissipation are entertaining, perhaps.” 

“I once knew a man,” Kenneth reflected, “who 
drank Pond’s extract.” 

“Goodness! What for?” 

Kent roared. “Oh, for entertainment, of course. 
Some folks have a bad internal sprain that demands 
liniment, coddling, and light literature.” 

So Kenneth had plunged into the Roman Re- 
public; gathering his material quickly, and finding 
to his surprise that with Nannette to suggest, Enid 
to copy, and Kent to criticise, he could easily do 
fifteen hundred words a day; insomuch that he now 
found his work drawing to its closing chapters 
without abating one jot of that enthusiasm with 
which he had begun; the entire movement having 
rushed onward eagerly, headlong, in a manner that 
amazed and delighted him though he resolutely re- 


358 


GOD'S REBEL. 


fused to claim any proprietary rights whatsoever. 
“Lo!” he had laughed, “the Law of the Division of 
Labour in literature.” 

Poverty, however, that begets an excess of heart, 
of feeling, is fatal to art. And he knew it, but 
generally found himself helpless to avoid its meshes. 
For what is heart save hunger, out of the past or 
the present? And so, in spite of his absorption in 
his plot, never once could he forget its every eco- 
nomic relations. And over this latter he had had 
many a wordy war when his manuscript was re- 
turned to him, beautifully written, but with whole 
paragraphs deleted which he vaguely remembered 
having written with no little labour. The story 
being written at Enid’s home, he had gone there 
on the morning following his abandonment of 
newspaper work, intending to complete the final 
chapters. The house was silent when he entered; 
and, passing into the library, for three hours he 
worked rapidly, without interruption. Then push- 
ing back his chair, he rose, and picking up the 
sheets last copied, began reading them over hastily. 

A frown was on his face when Enid entered. 
“Why, what’s the matter?” she asked as he glanced 
up. “Did I disturb you — aren’t you glad to see 
me?” 

“Yes, indeed I am!” he exclaimed, coming to- 
wards her. “Look here now, Enid!” and he tapped 
the manuscript sternly with his free hand, “What 
have you done with those two whole paragraphs? 
You know what I mean — concerning that corn- 
law!” 

“Corn-law! Dear me!” she protested, “I didn’t 
see anything about that. Really, Kenneth, you 
must have dreamt it.” 

“No, no, you know what I mean! The Lex 
Frumentaria — where is it?” 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 


359 


She smiled ingenuously. “Oh, is that it?” she 
asked, with evident relief. “You know I read that 
over two or three times, Kenneth. It was terribly 
stupid. I thought you must have fallen to writing 
an editorial for the Republican and got it twisted 
into your manuscript by mistake. I left it out, of 
course. There was entirely too much of it. 

He glowered at her. “Humph! how do you tell 
when there’s too much or not enough?” he asked 
incredulously. “I’m sure I can’t.” 

“Well, then, just leave it to me,” she answered 
generously. “I can generally tell when I’m bored. 
Don’t you like the way it’s copied? You see I’ve 
found a new way to write with the fountain-pen. 
You just turn it with the hollow side up and it 
writes ever so much prettier — don’t you think so?” 

It diverted, but did not convince him. ' “Listen, 
Enid,” he said despairingly, “you have cut out the 
strongest part. If it failed to interest you it is be- 
cause of my faulty art, not of the matter itself. The 
whole history turns on that — on the economics; 
otherwise all history would be nothing but a mere 
conglomerate of meaningless incidents. You know 
how it was with Christianity, how it had its origin 
because the poor of that day were forced to bind 
themselves together in small communes in order to 
exist at all, rather than because a few fanatics hoped 
to get to heaven thereby. It’s the promised Sun- 
day-school picnic and Christmas tree that makes 
the omnivorous small boy anxious over his soul, 
and drives him pell-mell into the church. Every- 
where the masses are more interested in saving 
their stomachs than their souls — food is a stronger 
force than conventional religion.” 

“But why should you speak of it here — why not 
let it pass, or leave it to be imagined?” 

“Simply because,” he answered slowly, “it is 


360 


GOD’S REBEL . 


part of the unfortunate destiny of a seer, who must 
always spend the best years of his life in arguing 
over truths that should be self-evident, in order that 
fools may agree and that solidarity and progress 
may go on the faster. It was so with the Gracchi 
— has always been so.” 

He startled and confused her — was bound to sail 
without a thought of commerce. “I admit the 
truth, Kenneth,” she stammered, “and its strength. 
But don’t you see it would make enemies? Why 
can you not be reasonable — why forget that the 
sole purpose of writing this book is to sell it?” 

He paused in his strides, then turned and came 
towards her, seated himself in his chair. She was 
leaning against his desk. 

“Yes, I know,” he replied keenly, bitterly, “lit- 
erature is in the same fix as everything else. No 
man shall do his best, speak, write, or paint the 
truth that is in him, lest he frighten away the public. 
I must immediately make preparations to have my 
work screamed in the market-place, the while I 
go stand on the street-corner and hold out my 
hand: Grant me, O heartless world that hastens, 
rose-bud maidens, stalwart youths, double-breasted 
men of business — grant me, I beseech, this merest 
right to live by buying my book! Contains no 
ideas and warranted not to kill!” 

Her face saddened. “Forgive me,” she implored. 
“Indeed, Kenneth, I never meant to remind you of 
that; only — I do so want you to succeed! You 
have suffered so much that you do not realise the 
force of your every passionate word — in your work 
or when you speak. I would give all the world to 
have you forget it all.” 

Eyes and voice were of the sea. He caught her 
to him. 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 361 

“My love! You have given it. I forget only too 
often!” 

And so he wrote on, feverishly, impatiently, ap- 
preciating to the full how slight were the bonds 
that now gave an apparent permanency and shape 
to his life. True, in the ardour of work he might 
occasionally forget, might even deceive himself with 
the idea that he was an integral part of the world, 
and not a mere interloper, or at best only an on- 
looker condemned yet tolerated for a space. For 
what was his work, after all? What substance had 
it? How could he look his own Roman townsmen 
in the eye and give the satisfactory pass-word to 
their constant challenge, sneering and contemptu- 
ous, even war-like: “Cui bono? cui bono?” Es- 
pecially when even his dearest friends could not 
honestly vouch for his success in a field where every- 
thing was so uncertain. And to cap it all, the ink 
was scarcely dry on his final page when the war 
broke out with Spain. Whereupon Kent advised 
delaying publication until fall. “I want it to make 
a hit,” said the publisher, “and believe it will. But 
it would be sheer madness to bring it out now — 
might even spoil its chances altogether.” 

“And in the meantime, I suppose,” Kenneth had 
answered laconically, “I shall have to go to war in 
order to get a living.” 

Kent laughed. “Good heavens! if I found 
my right to get an honest living denied me by the 
organised pirates of society, I should raise such a 
howl as should move heaven and earth! There is 
no right nor sense in keeping still, in concealing 
such matters. They ought to be known by every 
one, and the man who makes them known ought 
to have the thanks of every honest man and woman 
the world over. No man need feel a minute’s shame 
in finding himself out of work in a world where all 


GOD’S REBEL. 


362 

natural opportunities are monopolised by a pack of 
plutocrats who are ruthlessly bent on squeezing us 
and all posterity out of existence. No, I shouldn’t 
enlist; a country that fails to provide work for all 
its people in times of peace is a country that is not 
worth fighting for in times of war! Think of it — 
a government that hypocritically guarantees to pro- 
tect its citizens from foreign invasion, yet refuses, 
what is infinitely more important, to stand between 
them and starvation! By the way, have you ever 
tried the labour papers?” 

Kenneth shook his head. 

“Well, I’d try them. You may strike something. 
Good-by.” 

But again he was doomed to disappointment. 
“Why, Dr. Moore,” replied the editor of one of 
those papers whom he knew slightly, “we should 
always be more than pleased to publish anything 
you write, but as for paid contributors, we have 
none.” 

From the labour papers he made a tour of the 
libraries. At one of these the librarian came out of 
his room and spoke to him — a gracious, kindly 
gentleman with a growing reputation as a minor 
poet. There was an unawakened, far-off frenzy 
glowing in his eyes, and it was plainly with no little 
effort that he aroused himself sufficiently to appre- 
ciate Kenneth’s request. Then with a start he 
replied: 

“Dear me! I am very, very sorry, but it would 
be no use to leave an application, as I have more 
names now than I can possibly find positions for 
during the next ten years.” 

It was growing dark as he started home, yet he 
concluded to walk and save his car-fare. Thirty- 
odd blocks of variable length, that he could have 
traversed in an hour if he had not been set upon 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 


363 


by a pair of footpads and hit over the head. When 
he regained his senses sufficiently to go on, he made 
his way to the nearest police-station, where he re- 
ported his loss — a gold watch with his mother’s pic- 
ture in the case, and some sixty dollars, perhaps, in 
loose change and greenbacks. All he had — at any 
rate. It was annoying; a man’s judgment is 
scarcely to be commended for its dispassionateness 
after such an adventure; for the first time he con- 
ceded that those alleged Christian preachers in the 
churches of his city might not be SO' far wrong, 
after all, when they counselled the cold-blooded 
shooting down of such highwaymen. He hated to 

lose his watch, anyway 

Throughout the evening his head ached fearfully; 
causing him to seek his bed early, and, after count- 
ing the chiming hours till midnight, to fall at last 
into a strange half-sleep peopled with the phantoms 
of delirium. In shadowy guise they appeared 
to him, the forms and the myths outgrown amid the 
semblance of scenes forgotten. Not an act of his 
life but came trooping forth, each with its appro- 
priate actor as if long trained to the role. For an 
instant they halted before him, a motley company, 
habited all alike in black, silhouetted clearly against 
the scarlet curtain of his fancy. Then a bell chimed 
faintly, once — and they began passing before him. 
The drama had begun — that drama of one’s life 
which men in general are so loth to attend. And 
alas! ’tis but a poor play at best. All men would 
confess it; all would declare that the veriest tyro in 
play-writing, given carte blanche , could produce 
something infinitely more sane, more virile, more 
amusing, than this miserable fizzle of their own 
fruitless lives. O God, a poor thing in good sooth! 
Though perchance it might all have been different, 
quite different, had each been free — free to act at 


3 6 4 


GOD'S REBEL . 


all times the role he knew to be right. From boy- 
hood to youth and on into ripening manhood, how 
without order and method it all seemed! 

Then remoter events gave place to the present 
as the dreamer turned and tossed in his sleep. At 
first he had lain very quietly, content merely to 
look on, feeling a moment’s vague impersonal in- 
terest, compassion, disapproval, or even cynical 
amusement, over the situations and struggles of 
the luckless puppets. For anyone could see how 
the performance must terminate; the most un- 
tutored theatre-goer could have foretold disaster 
from the moment that a faint gray line began to 
appear in the background, to acquire shape and sub- 
stance, becoming at last a stone-wall that towered 
constantly higher and higher as the play contin- 
ued and the puppets approached, and that now 
frowned and cast its shadow over the entire stage. 
Beyond was a land where the sun shone, where even 
puppets might be happy, might become worthy the 
name of men and women, it was agreed — even by 
the most practical and conservative! Folly, though, 
to attempt to tear down the structure stone by 
stone ! Its invisible heights had never been scaled, 
and as for passing round it, impossible! — it encir- 
cled the earth. Whence the puppets all turned 
back — all save one; save one, who, with hands tied 
behind him, fell straightway to beating his head 
against the wall. Whereat the others laughed in 
derision, asked if he was going straight through 
it, and lo! all the theatre roared in response. It 
was very comical; one could hear his skull as it 
struck the naked stones, time and again, time and 
again. Then the laughter died away. “Good God! 
would the fool never cease?” 

Kenneth sat bolt upright in bed, clasping his 
head between his hands. The room spun round 


THE GODS SEND WAR. 


365 

him as he stood on his feet and felt his way to the 
bureau where he lit the gas, turning it on full and 
bright. At the foot of his bed hung a heavy Ger- 
man schlafrock which he drew on, slipping his feet 
into a pair of felt pantofles as he sank into' a chair. 
By this the phantasmagoria had passed, all save 
the final image, with its knocking headache. After 
sitting a moment he again rose, and turning to a 
shelf he picked up a small glass-stoppered phial 
half-full of white crystals. This perhaps would ease 
that infernal throbbing — if he should take enough. 
He had sometimes taken it before, for sleepless- 
ness; and filling a glass one-third full of water he 
added the crystals slowly. “To cease upon the 
midnight with no pain.” Never, perhaps, had the 
words startled and appealed to him in that way. 
But he dissolved no more than the usual dose; and 
drinking it off, sat down to await its relief. And 
whilst he waited, wearily, his arms resting on the 
table that was littered with writing material, he 
drew a tablet towards him and began to write; with 
visible effort at first, and then at the close more 
naturally — 

“You know how it is, dear; I should never be 
satisfied as things are, never contented now till 
every man has the merest right to do right. And 
this I have been taught the folly of expecting — 
at least in my day. There is such a thing, per- 
haps, as a man’s being made drunk with the om- 
niscient wine of Democracy. Well, such a person 
is very unpleasant company, continually getting 
his friends into trouble. I should only go on sailing 
your ship out into the storm, though it were 
wrecked a thousand times. Do you know, Enid, I 
have always blamed you a little for that — the devil 
was in the storm that day! No, not for that; yet 
if you had made me stay with you under the trees, 


366 


GOD'S REBEL . 


content to play with your big wax dolly, I feel 
sure it might all have been quite different, some- 
how. 

“By the way, a couple of business-men picked my 
pocket last night. I don’t care for the money — 
certainly not as much as they; but they kept my 
watch. If you can I wish you would get it, and keep 
it. My mother’s picture was in the back. Of 
course it would be no use to advertise, but if you 
ever run across old Spanish Pete ask him to find 
it for you. Poor old chap! I happen to know 
that he handles that sort of merchandise. And so, 
Enid — good-by.” 

At ten o’clock the following morning Kenneth 
stood in line at a recruiting station, and at noon he 
started south with his regiment. 


EPILOGUE. 


367 


EPILOGUE 


An ass, a dog, and a man. 

“Get up, Solomon!” 

The man slapped the ass; the dog barked gladly, 
frisked about his master a moment, then set off 
on a mad chase after a rabbit in the chapparal, and 
the ass started forward. 

Shouldering their way upward from the fertile 
green valley that fairly revelled below in its luxuri- 
ous largesses, this trio had come to a pause for mid- 
day refreshment in the shade of a group of live oaks 
where the foothills fringed the mesa. It was mid- 
January, the hillsides everywhere blossomed with 
violets and forget-me-nots in their beds of green; 
and making a pied parterre of the mesa-land stood 
patches of golden poppies with sun-worshipping 
faces uplifted to the father of all, aflame in the in- 
finite azure. Backward rose the spires of an infant 
city sweltering in the broad stare of noon; and be- 
yond, in seductive majesty, mistress and queen of 
the freshening breeze and its kisses of orient sweet- 
ness, swept the Pacific ocean, sparkling and radiant. 

The man removed his sombrero, and the breeze, 
as he faced it a moment, tumbled the dark hair over 
his forehead, fetching a smile of sheer seduction. 
Then again, “Get up, Solomon!” he urged, turning 
and half pushing the obstinate little beast through 
an abrupt descent between the hills and down a 
rugged pathway towards a canon that opened and 
gradually unfolded before them into a broad beau- 


GOD’S REBEL. 


368 

tiful valley. A glade winding ever upward through 
the heart of the perennial oaks, alternating with 
level and velvety swards where the grotesque syca- 
mores coiled and sported in strange antediluvian 
shapes suggestive of predatory life, that caused the 
conservative Solomon to pause ever and anon and 
wink a distrustful ear in their forbidding direction. 

“No, it’s all right, old fellow,” his master as- 
sured him; “there’s nothing up here to be leery 
over more dangerous than trees, or birds, or rab- 
bits. By the universal Pan!” And again he 
paused for a moment, stood peering up through 
the tall trees and afar to the eastward where ran 
the amethyst battlements whose peaks were capped 
with the eternal snows. Near by the wild canary 
called from its nest in the eglantine, whilst that 
mournful stealer of notes the sweetest and saddest, 
the mocking-bird, listened and echoed at intervals, 
impatiently waiting for night when he should have 
the star-lit stage to himself. No note save nature’s 
anywhere, save for the far-off tinkling of bells that 
floated over the glade from a thousand grassy hills 
where the flocks were feeding. 

Drawing a letter from his pocket, the man stood 
there an instant reading the close, smiling softly 
the while — 

“It is all too horrible; I feel that the city is 
crushing the life out of me. Enid has determined 
to go abroad, but I — I am going home, to my 
father’s. Someday, perhaps, you will come to see 
me; I hope so. But you know my people have 
moved to California — they live fifteen miles from 
the nearest station. Think of that! Good-by — 
Nannette. P. S. — Don’t forget to send me the 
Sun regularly.” 

Sam chuckled. Fifteen miles from the nearest 
station — what a conceit, when he had come more 


EPILOGUE . 


3^9 


than two thousand already! “Go on, Solomon!” 
And again the caravan resumed its journey. It was 
during the summer whilst he was away on his vaca- 
tion that the letter had come to him, and when he 
returned to the city the writer was gone. Where- 
upon he wrote her that very same night and with 
no little labour and painstaking; had in fact seldom 
been so critical in revising a manuscript — and it 
wasn’t right even then! The following morning 
he burned it, resolved not to risk all on a thing so 
inadequate as a letter. And now — well, he was 
surely within five miles of it, at any rate! The day 
before he had left the overland train at a grass- 
grown country side-track; finding no available 
transportation he had spent the night with a neigh- 
bouring rancher, and early in the morning, having 
obtained the loan of a burro and quickly making a 
pack of those encumbrances of an effete civilisation 
fetched with him, he had set forth, with the ranch- 
er’s dog to guide him. 

It was late in the afternoon, the setting sun flood- 
ing the horizon, when he reached a point far up 
the canon where it broadened out into a green 
nest between tall mountains with cool sparkling 
fords and level stretches, where he again encoun- 
tered signs of society, enclosed and guarding its 
rights. From a distance he saw that the house was 
built close beside the brow of the mountain, sur- 
rounded by the live-oaks and sycamores; and, as he 
came nearer, that it was low, rambling, white, with 
a broad verandah; in front was a croquet-ground, 
and at its edge, floating beneath the fern-leafed 
peppers, was a hammock — ah me, a hammock! To 
the right of the house ran the dark green groves 
of orange and lemon, golden fruited and fragrant 
of volatile blossom ; whilst over the hills to the left 


24 


370 


GOD’S REBEL . 


ranged the broad open orchards of olive, and the 
wide-leafed fig, and the vine. 

Some one was crossing the ford behind him, and 
he turned. A small, brown, bare-footed boy on 
horseback, greeted him in manly fashion as he 
came up, and then, directly, but with manifest anxi- 
ety faltering in his tones, asked: “1 don’t sup- 
pose you are looking for a job, are you, sir?” 

“A job? Why, yes — I don’t know. Does Mr. 
Nielsen live here?” 

“Yes, sir,” the boy smiled, “but my father’s not at 
home. Our man left yesterday and he’s gone to 
town to look for another — some one to watch the 
bees and run the honey-extractor. Six bits a day 
and your board.” 

Sam staggered, and leaned against Solomon. 
Why, he reflected with amusement, at that price 
he could stay on indefinitely; himself and his ass 
and his dog and everything that was his. Six bits a 
day and found — by the beard of Abraham! 

“I’ll take it!” he cried with avidity. 

The little fellow glanced at him, in momentary 
approval, quickly giving place, however, to a look 
of suspicion. “Oh, you needn’t think it’s a snap, 
if that’s what you’re looking for,” he admonished. 
“You know we’re used to tramps.” 

Sam laughed; clearly his employer had been 
bred to business. But whilst he stood there, bar- 
gaining, the strains of the Wieniawski Legende 
floated out to him, and he answered quickly : “No, 
I’m not looking for that, quite. In fact, I know I 
should suit you.” 

“All right, then,” and the boy slid off his horse. 
“I’ll look after your things. You go on to the 
house — supper will be ready pretty soon.” 

And Sam obeyed, already with a pleasant sense of 
feeling himself a part of the ranch instead of only a 


EPILOGUE. 


371 


mere interloper — and with doubtful business at 
that. Midway to the house, however, he again 
paused, struck with the scene and its ever changing 
beauty. In the north, the east, the south, not a 
cloud to be seen, not yet in the deepening dome 
whence the stars were beginning to flash. Low 
down in the western horizon, however, rose the 
mists of the summer sea, slow-mounting, in gran- 
deur of grays that deepened to pyramid purples and 
pyres of gold, unfolding in flame, and veiling the 
mid-horizon with a crimson fleece wherethrough 
the waning light shone soft and pale, lending a 
vivid violet-light to the mountains and their loftiest 
snow-clad peaks silhouetted against the eastern 
sky. 

As he approached the house, the music suddenly 
broke off and some one stepped out on the porch. 
And through the deepening rose-light he saw her 
clearly; the dear little figure gowned in white, 
grown a trifle stouter perhaps, and the face — with 
more of the sun’s deep brown in her cheeks and 
the gold that gleamed in her hair; worn again 
in its natural curl, and reminding him swiftly of 
the country girl as she had first flown into their 
office, upsetting all their plans in a flash. 

“Sam,” she cried, “is it truly you?” 

“Little one.” 

She held out both hands to him, uncertainly, with 
a little cry; and he — the crushing monopolist! — 
refused them both, took her in his arms. Yes, he 
had felt all along it was better than writing! 

“But why didn’t you let me know?” she asked, 
releasing herself. “How in the world did you get 
here — and can you stay — a little while?” 

He reassured her. “Oh, yes, I expect to stay all 
winter.” 

“Dear me!” 


37 2 


GOD'S REBEL. 


“You see, I’ve just hired out, this very moment, 
to — to stay and run the honey-machine.” 

She burst into laughter. “Truly? Did Tom 
have the impudence to take you for the new man? 
How ridiculous!” 

An hour later, however, her father returned with 
a man from town; whereupon his own engage- 
ment was set aside, though his welcome was none 
the less cordial. A large family and a shrewish 
mother, whence he conjectured thatNannette usual- 
ly had her hands full. But no, she denied the infer- 
ence. “You see,” she explained, as they rambled 
over the hills in search of wild-flowers on the fol- 
lowing morning, “it is not as it was — the children 
were little then; now they are able to help them- 
selves and be out of the house. Really, I have 
far more time to myself than when back in the 
city.” 

“But don’t you find it a — a little lonesome, at 
times?” he urged hopefully. 

She hesitated a moment. “Yes, perhaps,” bit- 
ing the stem of a flower; “but it’s certainly better 
than back there, where everyone is being drawn 
down in the whirlpool, and nobody can mention it 
for fear of being deemed a fanatic. Oh, it all 
seems like a nightmare sometimes! And I know 
he was right; he convinced me. Henceforth when- 
ever I look out upon the industrial world where 
great masses of men are employed at a mere living 
wage and a few millionaires waxing fat on their 
produce, I shall see it no more with the innocent 
eyes of the child — or the stupidly blind. Yet how 
futile it all was! Then to think of his joining the 
army, with so many others of the hopeless unem- 
ployed — and giving his life at El Caney! Patriot- 
ism? Why, situated as he was, it was downright 


EPILOGUE. 


373 

folly — the last ironical jest of the plutocratic gods 
that he fought!” 

Kent made no reply, went on helping her fill 
her hands with the violets and forget-me-nots. “Did 
Enid write you,” he asked, “about my finding his 
watch for her? You see we advertised for it, after 
we could get no trace of old Pete. Then one day 
I met him; he had been ill in some hospital, didn’t 
even know Kenneth had gone; was seeking him 
even then. Well, I told him, and the old fellow 
simply burst into tears like a child. When at last 
he gave me the watch he pressed the spring and 
the case flew open. And do you know what he 
said?” 

She gianced up. “I can’t imagine.” 

“Well, that was his daughter.” 

“His daughter — you mean Kenneth’s mother?” 

Kent nodded. He even offered money to Ken- 
neth once, it seems, but the latter refused it. The 
old man thought he was proud. ‘He thought my 
money wasn’t honest, senor,’ he complained. 
‘Caramba! as though there ever were such a thing 
as honest money!’ A week later I learned of his 
death.” 

“But did he really have money?” 

“Oh yes; some fifteen or twenty thousand in cash. 
I believe it went to some missionary or ‘Don’t 
Worry’ society. Haven’t you enough of these, 
little one?” 

He stood up, straightened the kink out of his 
back, kissed the flowers and handed them to her. 


THE END. 





















